
Class. 
Book. 



LRl843 



Gopyiightll^. 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




Grace C. Strachai 




Mrs. Beverly Dabney Benson {nee Jean Strachan) 



THE STORY OF THE STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE 

BEING MADE BY THE WOMEN TEACHERS 

OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK 



BY 

GRACE C. STRACHAN 




1910 

"B. F. BUCK & COMPANY 

160 Fifth Avenue 

NEW YORK 






Copyright, 1910 

Bt B. F. buck & COMPANY 

New York 



CC1,A3B80;'5 



To my sister, Mrs. Beverly Dabney Benson^ nee Jean Strachan, 

who, though not a teacher herself, worked devotedly 

and untiringly for ^' Our Cause," ^ I lovingly 

dedicate this book. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTEB ^^^^ 

Preface 7 

Organization of I. A. W. T. and List of Honor- 
ary Vice-Presidents ...... 15 

I Foreword 23 

General Outline 25 

Chronological Summary ...:.. 46 
II Are Men Teachers Needed? .... 48 

III Are Men Teachers Needed for Special 

Purposes? 53 

IV Are Men Teachers Needed Because They 

Are Better Teachers? 58 

V Are Men Teachers Needed for Their 

Manly Influence? Gy 

VI Are Men Teachers Needed to Prevent 

Feminization ? 81 

VII Supply and Demand ' . 90 

VIII Scarcity of Women Teachers Breeds De- 
terioration IN Quality of Teachers and 

Overcrowded Classes 97 

IX Scarcity of Teachers, but Unappointed 

Men 106 

X False Cry of Scarcity of High School 

Men Ill 

XI The Family-to-Support Argument . . 117 
XII Civil Service and Salary Schedules . . 128 
XIII Women Teachers and Other Women Civil 

Service Employees . . . ... . 135 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER. PAGE 

XIV Cost . . 143 

XV Is THE Davis Law Unconstitutional? . 183 

XVI Glaring Inequalities and Inconsistencies 197 

XVII The White Bill of 1907 202 

XVIII The White Bill of 1908 211 

XIX Conciliation Committee and Six-and-Six 

Plan 217 

XX Gledhill-Foley Bill ....... 229 

XXI The Somers Resolution . . . . „ 241 

XXII Discriminations Other Than Salary . 250 

XXIII Home Rule and Mandatory Legislation 268 

XXIV Some Features of Hearing Before Mayor 

McClELLAN T.'J'i) 

XXV Teachers and Politics ...... 277 

XXVI Bird Story 332 

Part II. Speeches, Mass Meetings, Hearings, 

Banquets 334 

Part III. Editorial Comment 428 

Part IV. Letters 472 

Part V. Endorsements . , 545 

Part VI. Equal Pay Bills and Other Documents 555 



PREFACE 

Salary — A periodical allowance made as compensation to 
a person for his official or professional services or for his 
regular work. — Funk and Wagnalls. 

Notice the words, "a person." Here is no differentia- 
tion between male persons and female persons. 

Yet the City of New York pays a " male " person for 
certain " professional services " $900, while paying a " fe- 
male " person only $600 for the same " professional serv- 
ices." Stranger still, it pays for certain experience of a 
"male" person $105, while paying a "female" person 
only $40 for the identical experience. These are but sam- 
ples of the " glaring inequalities " in the teachers' salary 
schedules. 

Why is the male in the teaching profession differentiated 
from the male in every other calling, when his salary is 
concerned ? 

Why does the city differentiate the woman it hires to 
teach its children from the woman it hires to take steno- 
graphic notes, use a typewriter, follow up truants, inspect 
a tenement, or issue a license ? 

Why are not the appointees from the eligible lists estab- 
lished by the Department of Education, entitled to the same 
privileges and rights as appointees from Civil Service lists 
from other City and State Departments? 

Some ask, " Shall the single woman, in teaching, be given 
the married woman's wage ? " I do not know what they 
mean, but I say, " Why not the single woman in teaching 
just as much as the single woman in washing, in farming, 
in dressmaking, in nursing, in telephoning ? " 

Again, some ask, is there such a thing as " equal work " 
by two people? 

Technically, no. No two people do exactly the same 
work in the same way. This is true of all professional and 



8 PREFACE 

official worko Compare Mayor Gaynor's work with Mayor 
McCIellan's. Will any one say their work as Mayor is 
" Equal Work " ? And yet the pay is the samCo Do all 
policemen do " Equal Work " ? Yet they receive equal pay^ 
So with firemen, school physicians, tenement house inspec- 
torSc The taxpayers, no doubt, believe that, judged by his 
work, Mayor Gaynor is worth a far higher salary than 
many of his predecessors. But a great corporation like the 
City of New York cannot attempt to pay each of its em- 
ployees according to the work of that particular street 
cleaner or fireman or stenographer, and sq must be content 
with classifying its positions, and fixing a salary for eacho 
So should it do for its teachers. That is all we ask. 

The male teachers argue for a " family wage " for the 
" adult malco" Who ever heard a man who is a doctor or a 
lawyer or a plumber or a grocer or a baseball player or a 
barber or a janitor, advance such argument? 

This is surely " special pleading." A logical interpreta- 
tion would make it necessary for the Board of Education 
to base each salary on the individual worker's family. Man- 
ifestly on such a basis it would be unfair to pay the wealthy 
bachelor the same salary as the poor married man ; or the 
married man with seven children and a mother-in-law to 
support, the same as the married man whose father-in-law 
supports him„ Furthermore, the " family wage " restricted 
to " adult male " presupposes that the woman teacher has 
no family obligations. All intelligent people know that this 
is not true. But the chief objection to the " family wage " 
is that a just application of such a standard to any sched- 
ules, necessitates inquiry into one's private life, which is 
an intrusion to the extent almost of violating the Consti- 
tution. 

What good citizen will deny that selling 1800 pounds of 
coal as a full ton is bad for both the buyer and the seller? 
The former is cheated, but the latter is a cheat. 

Paying a man more money for teaching a class than is 
paid a woman for teaching the same class breeds two seri- 
ous evils for men teachers. The lesser of these evils is the 
lessening of their chance of appointment. 



PREFACE 9 

But ty far the g'reater evil to the man teacher in the un- 
just salary schedule, is the degeneration of his fine sense of 
truth, of honor, of justice. This placing of a false and 
inflated value on his services causes him to imagine he is 
something that he is not It is as if a four-foot man 
propped up on stilts should think that he was actually a 
six-foot man, and eligible for a place in the "Broadway 
Squad." An unbiased judge would soon expose his mas- 
querading and his true stature. 

It is akin to all those deceptions exemplified in such say- 
ings as "A lion in sheep's clothing." Not, however, that a 
male teacher who is opposing his sisters in the profession, 
is comparable to a lion. 

It is inevitable that the male teacher having been put by 
the State in a special and privileged class based simply on 
the accident of sex, should come to think he is some strange 
and unusual creature that must be pampered and decorated 
and even fed and clothed at the expense directly of his 
sister workers and indirectly of the community which sup- 
ports him, 

A man who thinks he is funny when he is not, becomes 
a bore. A man who thinks he is serious when he is only 
trite, becomes a joke. But a man who thinks he is worthy 
when he is not, becomes an unconscious and potential hyp- 
ocrite — a Pharisee, a " sounding brass and tinkling cymbal." 

Is there not great danger that the person — who simply 
because he happens to be of the male sex receives twice as 
big a salary as another person in an identical position who 
happens to be of the female sex — 'will gradually become an 
undesirable citizen. In nine cases out of ten, he knows in 
his heart that the children in the woman's class are deriv- 
ing greater benefit from her life and service than the chil- 
dren in his class are obtaining from his. Is he not taking 
unto himself things that are not rightfully his? And must 
it not follow, as the night the day, that his sense of truth 
is warped; his sense of justice, untrustworthy; his sense 
of right generally, unbalanced? 

This very male teacher, however, whose perception of 
true values has been blunted and distorted by the false 



lo PREFACE 

value put upon his services, is set up as thd mentor and the 
model for our boys and girls. Does it not inevitably fol- 
low that our boys and girls must suffer? Their sense of 
true values, their fineness of judgment, in short, their whole 
moral nature, is endangered,. You can not draw pure 
water from a pollutea welL 

Who will deny that a railroad track with one of its rails 
depressed three feet below the other is dangerous to all 
who travel on it? I hold that all who are connected with 
the enforcement and the operation of our unjust salary 
schedules are in danger of moral degeneration. There- 
fore, I hold that the entire community should fight the un-. 
just salary schedules paid our teachers, as immoral and as 
a menace to the welfare of the StatCo 

Let us all — those in the teaching system and those out 
of it — who are interested in making effective the purpose 
of our noble forefathers who planned our great and glori- 
ous Constitution "to establish justice'*; and "to promote 
the general welfare," unite in the determination to bring 
about a speedy amendment to this dangerous law. 

Senator Dolliver, Chairman of the Committee on Educa- 
tion and Labor, discussing a bill to prohibit child labor in 
the District of Columbia, said: "A strong feeling prevails 
in Congress that child labor regulation should be left to 
the states. One of the arguments that will be made for 
the proposed legislation for the District of Columbia will 
be that if Congress takes up child labor in the District of 
Columbia and handles it without gloves, it will set a good 
example for states that are slow in dealing properly with 
this subject." 

Let New York City handle the " woman labor '* trouble 
without gloves. 

The facts set forth hereafter prove that the State of 
New York and the City of New York degrade and belittle 
their women teachers in a markedly unusual way, and 
to a markedly unusual degree. Do not the women teach- 
ers resent this degradation and this belittling? Yes, the 
women teachers do. But often they are afraid to voice 
their resentment. Some of them are intimidated by their 



PREFACE II 

superior officers. The women teachers of New York City, 
though, after years of private complaining and inward re- 
senting, have formed themselves into a great united body 
whose voice is being heard 'round the world. There are 
so many of us — fifteen thousand and more — that the very 
strength of numbers has given us courage; and the timid, 
scattered cries of individuals have swelled into one great 
grand choral that reaches the hearts of the people. And 
the people rule! 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers of 
the City of New York sends greeting to all its sisters, and 
promises that the degradation and belittling will disappear 
" as mists of the morning." The recognition of women 
is but in its morning. 

Statistics show that the number of male teachers is not 
decreasing in the City of New York, but that it is increas- 
ing at a rate higher than that of the rest of the country; 
that indeed it is upwards of 25 per cent, greater than City 
Superintendent Maxwell is said to think necessary. 

The fetish of feminization is exploded by such author- 
ities as Professor Dewey and Professor Thorndike of Co- 
lumbiao It is upheld only by foreigners unacquainted with 
us, our customs, and our schools, and by a few misguided 
followers of such foreigners. 

The much mooted law of " Supply and Demand " is 
really a boomerang argument in the hands of our oppo- 
nents ; for besides the exposition offered by " The Associa- 
tion of Unappointed Men Teachers," figures from Super- 
intendent Maxwell's Tenth Annual Report show that in- 
stead of a scar^city there is an excess of teachers in our 
high schools. 

" Equal Pay " for men and women teachers is the rule 
in the cities of the great, free, progressive West. 

" Equal Pay " was the rule in Brooklyn until the passage 
of the Davis Law in 1900. 

The chief obstacle in our path, is the cost of " Equal 
Pay '* in dollars and cents. Think of that ! Then remem- 
ber that this is the country of Washington and Lincoln 
and Webster and Patrick Henry. Can any true American 



12 PREFACE 

say, " I know you are not getting a square deal, but I won't 
help you because it would cost me a dollar or two? Was 
it because the tax on tea would cost a penny or two that 
our forefathers fought the War of the Revolution? 

There is much said about "the proper calibre of men 
teachers," all of which propounds the theory that money 
is the only bait that will attract men to teaching, but little 
is said about the far more important thing — " the proper 
calibre of women teachers." Yet the facts are that the 
Board has for several years found it impossible to get a 
sufficient number of women teachers " of the proper cal- 
ibre." 

This unfortunate condition will persist while the Board 
of Education is encouraged by the state in the Davis Law, 
and is permitted by the city, to continue its unfair treat- 
ment of its women teachers. I would consider it a mat- 
ter for regret, if one of my four nieces or eight nephews 
should feel called upon to teach under our present system. 
I want my nephews to be manly men, and my nieces not to 
be contaminated by an environment of injustice. 



JUSTICE 

Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice; 
for they shall have their fill. (Matt, v.) 

" When people quit believing in justice, there's nothing 
doing in making them better." — Policeman John F. Foley, 
in Globe May 23, 1910. 

" A tower four square and impregnable is the just man. 
He is beacon and sanctuary for his fellows. He is pan- 
oplied in justice — that virtue which maketh for sterling 
character and which is one of the four strong hinges upon 
which the whole moral order turns. It is more than hon- 
esty, which is one of its features only, and it vitalizes 
honor, which is its bloom and fragrance. It giveth to 
every one — 'to God, to home, to country, to Caesar, to the 
man it sways — all that belongs to each. It respects every 
obligation and every right. The man who withholds theirs 



PREFACE 13 

from fiis fellows is recreant to God and to Caesar and 
tears into shreds self-respect, without which there is naught 
left but degeneracy. What a benefactor of his race is the 
just man ! His thoughts are of the loftiest and gentlest, 
his word is his bond and baffles bankruptcy ; his deeds 
shine like stars in the blackness of life's wretchedness. — 
Rev. P. A. Halpin, New Rochelle College, in New York 
Times, April 24, 1910. 

"The spirit of unrest is an inarticulate cry, it may be, 
for fair play. When that cry becomes articulate and 
vociferous, when the mighty American spirit is aroused, 
the bulwarks that protect special privileges and selfish in- 
terests will be battered down and the people once again 
will come into their own." — Dr. Felter, at Congregational 
Church dinner, Brooklyn, 

" The people are beginning to feel that these questions 
are moral questions, rather than economic. The next great 
task for the Christian Church to undertake is to plead the 
cause of the poor and the weak against special privilege 
and legislation in the interest of favorites. There can be 
no political and social equality so long as there is indus- 
trial inequality through class legislation. There is but one 
solution of the social problem in the republic — that is, the 
application of the Golden Rule to the laws of the street." — 
Dr. Hillis at Congregational Church dinner, Brooklyn. 

Wherever an injustice is done, evil will result. A great 
injustice is done the women teachers in our present salary 
schedules, and it is being perpetrated by the very depart- 
ment from which citizens have a right to expect the high- 
est ideals of justice and morality. 

The statutes of the State of New York may be read 
from beginning to end and there will be found no statute 
which deliberately places woman's service in a lower wage 
scale than man's, except Section 1091 of the charter of the 
City of New York — the " Davis Law." 

The cause of Equal Pay has attracted widespread at- 
tention and support. When the women teachers of New 
York City made their first organized protest they addressed 
themselves to the local authorities but were accorded such 



14 PREFACE 

contemptuous treatment that they found it necessary; to ap- 
peal to the Legislature for a statute reading* the principle 
into the charter. Equal Pay thus became immediately a 
question of widespread importance, and soon attained the 
proportions, the dignity and the momentum of a great so- 
cial movement. The principle of Equal Pay is representa- 
tive of the candid judgment of more than half the popula- 
tion, who are opposed to the present system as being a 
fundamental negation of their sense of fair play. They 
realize that long toleration and tacit acceptance of an in- 
justice but increase their obligation to destroy it. The 
movement is gaining strength and ground every day. 

The friends of Equal Pay insist that a more formal and 
specific statement of the inception, progress and prospects 
of the work should be made and it is because of their in- 
sistence that this book is written. Equal Pay has won 
support wherever its arguments have been fairly presented. 
I believe the day is not far distant when it will revolt the 
intelligence of everybody whose opinion is of any conse- 
quence to argue that there is any excuse for paying a 
woman less for the same work than is paid a man, whether 
that work be in a so-called profession or in the mechanical 
arts and trades. 

I shall have utterly failed in my purpose if those who 
read this book do not realize that this struggle for " Equal 
Pay " is a fight for simple justice. 

All intelligent people must acknowledge that injustice is 
immoral. All must agree that to practice or uphold in- 
justice is dangerous to the individual, the corporation, the 
municipality, the State, the Nation. 

It is the desire to assist in purging the profession, the 
city, the State, the Nation, to which I belong, of the great 
moral danger involved in the unjust practice of paying for 
service according to the sex of the servant, that has made 
me lead the fight of the women teachers. 

I offer this book in the same spirit. 

GRACE C. STRACHAN. 





Miss Maey A. Curtis, 
The Bronx. 



Miss Anna E. McAuliffe, 
Queens. 




Miss Annie B. Moriarty, 

Brooklyn. 

Chairman Organization Committee. 





Miss Lina E. Gans, 
Manhattan. 



Miss Clara I. Walson, 
Richmond. 



VICE-PRESIDENTS, INTERBORO ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN 
TEACHERS, NEW YORK CITY. 





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ORGANIZATION 

OF 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers 

In the annual report of the National Educational As- 
sociation for the year 1908, Prof. Ulysses G. Weatherby, 
University of Indianapolis, says that the " lower pay of 
women than that of men for equal work is due entirely to 
the lack of serious professional spirit and organization." 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers is 
the largest, most powerful, single organization of profes- 
sional women in the world. 

Early in 1907, the Journal said editorially : " In the In- 
terborough Association of Women Teachers, the women 
of the public school system of Greater New York have de- 
veloped an organization of ten thousand members, which 
is pledged and committed to the principle that the position 
should carry the salary in the school service. The in- 
justices of the present salary schedules have been felt for 
years by these ten thousand women ; but until the present 
organization was effected it was impossible for them to act 
as a unit. To-day the strength, energy and intelligence 
of every individual member are being utilized to a given 
end. Unity of action has been established, and the result 
is a campaign that has astonished the community and 
roused public conscience. The tremendous energy and de- 
votion of these women and their thousands of friends have 
also created a moral force and an intelligent power that is 
to be recognized and that must be reckoned with by civic 
organizations, politicians and political parties." 

There are various stories as to who was the first one to 
suggest that the women teachers should organize to secure 
" Equal Pay," All agree, however, that the credit of 

15 



i6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

starting the organization is due to Miss Kate Hogan, a 
teacher of a seventh year class of boys in a Manhattan 
school. Miss Hogan was elected first President, Miss 
Anne Goessling, Vice-President, Miss Isabel A. Ennis, 
Secretary, and Miss Fannie I. Flanly, Treasurer. The 
latter was soon obliged to resign on account of death in 
her family, and Mrs. N. Curtis Lenihen was chosen to 
succeed her. 

I attended the first meeting of the association in April, 
1906, simply to show my sympathy with the movement. 
Learning that I was eligible for membership, I paid the 
fifty cents dues, and I have never missed a meeting since, 
except on account of death or official business. In May, 
1906, at Miss Hogan's request, I accepted the chairman- 
ship of the Executive Committee. 

In November, the Association was shocked and saddened 
by the death of Miss Hogan. As the constitution made no 
provision for filling a vacancy caused by death, a special 
election was held at which Mrs. Lenihen was elected pres- 
ident, and Miss Ellen T. O'Brien, treasurer. 

In 1907 the constitution was amended so as to provide 
for a vice-president for each borough. Miss Alida S. Wil- 
liams was elected for Manhattan, but illness soon compelled 
her resignation, and she was succeeded by Miss Lina E. 
Gano, who has been unanimously re-elected every year 
since. Mrs. Annie B. Moriarty has always been the vice- 
president from Brooklyn. Miss Emma McCabe and Miss 
Mary A. Curtis have represented The Bronx; Mrs. Eliza- 
beth A. Loughlin and Miss Annie E. McAuliffe, Queens ; 
and Miss Rebecca Ludlum followed by Miss Clara I. Wat- 
son, Richmond. 

Mrs. Lenihen was re-nominated for the presidency, but 
ill health caused her to withdraw, and I was elected presi- 
dent in October, 1907. Mrs. Lenihen (now Mrs. Killeen) 
was made Honorary President. Miss Ennis is the only 
one of the original officers still serving. 

In 1907, an Organization Committee was founded with 
Mrs. Moriarty as chairman. Most effective work has been 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 17 

done by and through this committee. The vice-president 
of each borough is vice chairman for that borough, and is 
responsible for its organization. She must see that each 
Senate and each Assembly district has a competent and 
enthusiastic leader, and each school one or more delegates. 
The leaders and delegates of each district are expected to 
familiarize themselves with the boundaries of the district, 
the names of its representatives in the Legislature and the 
Board of Aldermen, and their attitude on "Equal Pay." 

The association has grown from less than a hundred in 
April, 1906, to upwards of 14,000 to-day. Splendid work 
was done by Miss Ennis as secretary and Mrs. Lenihen as 
treasurer in rolling up the membership in the early days. 
Later, the Organization Committee workers carried it on. 

Yeoman service has been rendered by all those named 
above from the beginning, but the brunt of the battle fell 
on Mrs. Lenihen, Miss Ennis, Miss O'Brien, Mrs. Mor- 
iarty and Miss Gano. I take this opportunity of telling 
all the members how much I appreciate their splendid 
united spirit and unselfish cooperation. The loyalty of 
the " primary teachers " is especially acknowledged be- 
cause of the continuous attempts of our opponents to 
weaken or destroy it. 

While the Interborough Association, in its fight has had 
a difficult task and some set-backs, it has never been de- 
feated. Why? The leaders have never lost faith. 

Robert Louis Stevenson, the Beloved, puts it this way: 

To feel in the ink of the slough 

And the sink of the mire 

Veins of glory and fire 

Run through and transpierce and transpire, 

And a secret purpose of glory fill each part. 

And the answering glory of battle fill my heart; 

To thrill with joy of girded men, 

To go on forever and fail, and go on again, 

And be mauled to the earth and arise. 

And contend for the shade of a word and a thing not 

seen with the eyes, 
With the half of a broken hope for a pillow at night — • 
That somehow the right is the right, 
And the smooth shall bloom from the rough. 



i8 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



HONORARY VICE-PRESIDENTS 



Justice William Crane. 
Justice Dittenhoefer. 
Justice Stephen Stephens. 
Justice Vernon Davis. 
Justice J. W. Gerard. 
Justice M. L. Erlanger. 
Justice C. H. Truax. 
Justice E. F. O'Dwyer 
Judge George J. O'Keefe. 
Ex-Justice Edward H. Hatch. 
Justice Robert J. Wilkin. 
Judge Frank O'Reilly. 
Judge J. G. Tighe. 
Judge Morgan M. L. Ryan. 
Monsignor Lavelle. 
Monsignor Edward McCarty. 
Monsignor J. I. Barrett. 
Rabbi Stephen S. Wise. 
Rev. Charles Cassidy. 
Rev. Joseph H. McMahon, 

D. D. 
Rev. Percy S. Grant. 
Rev. C. R. Duryee. 
Mons. J. T. Woods. 
Lieutenant-Governor White. 
Hon. John H. McCooey. 
Hon. William H. Edwards. 
Sen. Thomas F. Grady. 
Hon. James E. March. 
Cong. William Sulzer. 
Cong. Otto G. Foelker. 
Hon. Julius Harburger. 
Hon. Charles McCormack. 
Hon. John B. Byrne. 
Hon. John J. Cronin, M. D. 
Aid. George Markert. 
Walter T. Edgerton. 
Hon. Timothy L. Woodruflf. 
Hon. Patrick F. McGowan. 
Hon. William Leary. 
Hon. Charles F. Murphy. 
Hon. Robert Hebberd. 
Hon. Walter Bensel, M. D. 
Hon. Robert H. Elder. 
Hon. John S. Shea. 
Hon. Arthur Murphy. 
Hon. Patrick Hayes. 
Hon. William F. Sheehan. 
J. Hampden Dougherty. 



Anna B. Allan. 

Miss Helen Varick Boswell. 

Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake. 

Beatrice Fairfax. 

Mrs. J. Borden Harriman. 

Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt. 

Mrs. James W. Gerard. 

Mrs. Martin W. Littleton. 

Dorothy Dix. 

Mrs. Harriet Stanton Blatch. 

Mrs. Gilbert E. Jones. 

Mrs. Charles H. Hyde. 

Mrs. William A. Engemann. 

Mrs. Forbes Robertson. 

Miss Mary Drier. 

Mrs. Cynthia Westover 

Alden. 
Mrs. E. W. Townsend. 
Dr. Anna Shaw. 
Miss Ida Craft. 
Mrs. Harry Hastings. 
Mrs. Thomas J. Vivian. 
Miss Margaret Lavelle. 
Miss Margaret Schlessinger. 
Mrs. Frederick Nathan. 
Dr. Adelaide Wallerstein. 
Mrs. Earl S. King. 
Mrs. William H. Hotchkin. 
Mrs. Helen Hoy Greeley. 
Mrs. James Lees Laidlaw. 
Miss Anne Morgan. 
Lewis Nixon. 
Caesare Conti. 
Major Edward R. Gilman. 
Clement B. Asbury. 
John J. Harrington. 
Antonio Zucca. 
Harold B. Christensen. 
Theodore Sutro. 
Henry Batterman. 
Nathaniel H. Levi. 
George G. DeBevoise. 
S. T. Hollister. 
Cyrus Frederick Leubuscher. 
George R. Crowly. 
Howard Marshall. 
C. V. Gould (James Mc- 

Creery & Co.") 
Alexander Delia Paoli. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



19 



Hon. Mirabeau L. Towns. 
Charles H. Strong. 
George Foster Peabody. 
Isaac H. Russell. 
George W. Titcomb. 
John Francis Yawger. 
Hon. Robert H. Roy. 
John Lorenz Cronin. 
A. F. Lauterbach. 
Col. Alexander S. Bacon. 
Eugene Lamb Richards. 
Charles F. Kingsley. 
Edward McCrossin. 
Charles V. Nellany. 
Hon. James A. Donnelly. 
Hon. Henry N. Tifft. 
Hon. Joseph W. Keller. 
George B. Hanavan. 
Benjamin Blumenthal. 
James Edward Gravilly. 
Mrs. William J. Gaynor. 
Mrs. Charlotte B. Wilbour. 
Mrs. William Gumming 

Story. 
Mrs. Mirabeau L. Towns. 
Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 
Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont 
Ida Plusted Harper. 
Mrs. Belle de Rivera. 
Mrs. Charlotte Iranni. 
Mrs. Egerton L. Winthrop, 

Jr. 
Mrs. Edward Lauterbach. 
Mrs. William M. Ivins. 
Mrs. James Griswold Wentz. 
Miss Margaret Grady. 
Mrs. Cora Welles Trow. 
Mrs. John S. Crosby. 
Mrs. John Francis Yawger. 
Mme. Katharine von Klem- 

mer. 
Dr. Frances Squire Potter. 
Mrs. Alma Webster Powell. 
Miss Eliza Macdonald. 



Frederick Nathan. 

Alfred B. Hall. 

John W. Sawyer. 

William S. Germain. 

George P. Eckman. 

Ezra W. Sampson. 

W. A. Duke. 

John Wanamaker. 

William H. McAdoo. 

Samuel Strauss. 

John A. Wilbur. 

Benjamin Blumenthal. 

Edward F. Linton. 

H. W. Lyall. 

M. Peter Benedict. 

Col. Alexander S. Bacon. 

Henry Siegel. 

John C. Sheehan. 

George C. Boldt. 

John C. Judge, Attorney. 

D. T. Cornell. 

E. W. Townsend. 
Guy Loring Smith. 
Edgar Smith. 
Browne C. Hammond. 
L. J. Fagan. 

James P. Quinn. 
James E. March. 
Charles J. Adams. 
Alfred I. Kirkup. 
Andreas Dippel. 
John Temple Grave's. 
Edwin Markham. 
Theodore Dreiser. 
Carl E Dufft. 
William Dean H'owells. 
Ellis Parker Butler. 
George W. Blake, 
Ossian Lang. 
Thomas J. Cunningham. 
James C. Monaghan. 
George Henry Payne. 
Major E. T. McCrystal 

(Irish American.) 
Alfred L. Manniere. 



Rev. James Alyward. 
Rev. James Burns. 



MINISTERS 



Rev. William A. Ring. 
Rev. Paul Reichertz. 
Rev. J. J. Slattery. 



20 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



Rev. John Braum. 
Rev. Henry A. Braum. 
Rev. Fred W. BlakesH. 
Rev. William Blakes. 

Rev. F. J. Castellano. 

Rev. I. J. Conlon. 

Rev. R. A. Cahill. 

Rev. P. H. Casey. 

Rev. John P. Chidwick. 

Rev. James Lyon Caughey. 

Rev. John C. Campbell. 

Rev. William V. Dunwell. 
Rev. John H. Dooley. 
Rev. George F. Dean. 
Rev. John Dolan. 
Rev. Thomas Daly. 
Rev. Joseph Donohue. 
Rev. J. J. Durkin. 
Rev. James Donlon. 
Rev. Thomas F. Ducui. 
Rev. J. Dunn. 

Rev. Luke Evers. 

Rev. James T. Fitzimmon. 

Rev. James J. Flood. 

Rev. Henry A. Fitzgerald. 

Rev. Charles H. Grubb. 
Rev. M. W. Gilbert. 
Rev. J. C. Grimmell. 
Rev. Walter A. Gardner. 
Rev. Percy S. Grant. 
Rev. C. F. Guntner. 
Rev. Anthony J. Grogan, 
Rev. D. W. Gill. 
Rev. B. F. Galligan. 
Rev Thomas F. Gregg. 
Rev. C. L. Goddell. 

Rev. R. Haepflin. 
Rev. Nicholas J. Hughes. 
Rev. J. H. Hinch. 
Rev. M. J. Henry. 
Rev. George Houghton. 
Rev. Dr. Hutchins. 
Rev. Jeremiah Heafy. 
Rev. E. S. Hollaway. 
Rev. John P. Hughes. 

Rev. F. H. Justa. 



Rev. J. M. Stanton. 
Rev. M. A. Sheehan. 
Rev. Samuel Schulman. 
Rev. Talbot John Smith. 
Dr. William Stinson. 
Dr. George M. Searle. 
Rev. Edvifin Sweeney. 
Rev. M. J. Scott. 
Rev. H. T. Scutter. 

Rev. M. Trathen. 
Rev. Mathew A. Taylor. 
Rev. T. D. Tempane. 
Rev. S. W. Tumms. 

Rev. George Van De Water. 
Rev. W. H. Vaughn. 
Rev. T. D. Van Wilderberg. 
Rabbi Faulk Vidaver. 
Rev. Michele De Vincent. 

Rev. Drew T. Wyman. 

Rev. J. A. Walther. 

Rev. D. D. Whittier. 

George Blake. 

John C. Freund. 

Reuben L. Gledhill. 

James A. Foley. 

Alfred E. Zass. 

William J. Bolger. 

Rev. W. W. Barringer. 

Henry E. Chapman. 

Thomas Freel. 

Rev. Alexander Irvine. 

Ezra Tuttle A. 

Lawrence Gresser. 

Miss Lewison. 

Miss Woerishaffer. 

Miss Mary Dreier. 

Belle De Rivera. 

Mrs. William Cummings-Story. 

Miss Charlotte Wilbour. 

Mrs. Harriet Johnston Wood. 

Mrs. C. W. Fisk._ 

Mrs. Harry Hastings. 

Mrs. John Francis Yawger. 

Mrs. Gilbert Jones. 

Miss Mary Garrett Hay. 

Mrs. George B. Reid. 

Miss Florence Guernsey. 

Mrs. John Zimmerman. 

Mrs. Root Francis Cartwright. 

Rev. W. H. Lawrence. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



21 



Rev Alva E. Knapp. 

Rev. William E. Katzenber- 

ger. 
Rev. John J. Keoghan. 
Rev. John J. Kellehan. 
Rev. John J. Knowles. 
Very Rev. Canon Knowles. 

Rev. J. D. Long. 
Rev. David Leahy. 
Rev. L. J. LockingeSr. 
Rev. J. A. Lyons. 
Rev. William Livingston. 

Rev. C. B. Lutz. 

Rev. Thomas F. McMillen. 

Rev. C. H. McGrath. 

Rev. A. H. C. Moorse. 

Rev. J. S. Moran. 

Rev. J. F. Molloi. 

Rev. P. E. McCorry. 

Rev. John McQuirk. 

Rev. William H. Murphy. 

Rev. P. J. Minogue. 

Rev. P. H. Maher. 

Rev. John J. McCahill. 

Rt. Rev. Charles McCreedy. 

Rev. Charles McKenna. 

Rt. Rev. James H. McGean. 

Rt. Rev. D. McMillan. 

Rev. Matin A. Meyer. 

Rev. Edw. McGuffey. 

Rev. John O'Donovan. 
Rev. J. F. X. O'Connor. 
Rev. Daniel O'Dwyer. 
Rev. J. F. O'Gorman. 

Rev. John P. Peters. 
Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst. 
Rev. John F. Patty. 
Rev. William L. Penny. 
Rev. James W. Power. 
Rev. S. Parin. 
Rev. M. J. Phelan. 
Rev. George S. Pratt. 
Rev. Lindsay Parker. 
Rev. John H. Pastoret. 

Rev. Charles T. Ritter. 
Rev. L. Rabe. 



iHon. James B. McEwen. 

Major McCrystal. 

Miss Lillie Devereaux Blake. 

John Meehan. 

Senator Stillwell. 

John Henry Payne. 

Rev. William Parkhurst 

Joseph Hyman. 

John Randolph. 

Charles F. Kingsley. 

Dr. N. J. Coyne. 

Jacob Mariner. 

Isaac Alden. 

Saul C. Lavine. 

Mr. F. Pitelli. 

Robert H. Elder. 

Judge H. Hylan. 

J. Diner. 

John Temple Graves. 

Justus Ralph. 

William A. Cokely. 

Thomas Mulry. 

Thomas I. Curtis. 

M. McConville. 

A. B. McStay. 
James P. Holland. 

B. Hannah. 
Clement B. Asbury. 
Richard Webber. 
Nathaniel H. Levi. 
Alfred L Kirkus. 
Dr. Robert F. Ives. 
Dr. J. Edward Herman. 
Rev. Robert N. Merriman. 
Rev. George C. Groves. 
Mrs. August Beyer. 
George Millard. 

George De Be Voise. 

Charles Adams. 

Charles Hollister. 

John Whalen. 

Terence P. Smith. 

Edward Moloughuey. 

Harold Dudley Greeley. 

George F. Elliot. 

Judge Morgan J. O'Brien. 

Eugene Philbin. 

Martin W. Littleton. 

Frederick Nathan. 

Rev._ John Donaldson. 

William Sulzer. 



Equal Pay for Equal Work 



CHAPTER I 
FOREWORD 

Rabbi Wise pointed out in his speech at our mass meet- 
ing on March 6, 1908, that our subject lacks the one merit 
of being- new, for as early as 1871, Wendell Phillips of- 
fered the following" resolution at a meeting at Worcester : 
" We demand, that whenever women are employed at pub- 
lic expense to do the same kind and amount of work as 
men perform, they shall receive the same wages." 

But the subject is older than that, for on July 29, 1862, 
the question of equal pay for equal work by teachers came 
up at the session of the New York Teachers' Association. 
The committee to which it had been referred reported 
against giving equal salaries to men and women teachers, 
although it was said that the salaries of women teachers 
should be larger. Miss Anthony (Susan B.) offered as a 
substitute for the committee's resolution another to the ef- 
fect that " justice requires that the amount of compensa- 
tion should not be regulated by sex, but by the amount of 
service rendered." After a sharp discussion, the previous 
question was ordered and the Anthony resolution was 
voted down. 

Section 1091 of our city charter, familiarly known as 
the Davis Law, sets forth the only logical consideration 
which should govern the fixing and regulating of salaries 
of teachers, in the words, " and the salaries of all princi- 
pals and teachers shall be regulated by merit, grade of 
class taught, length of service, experience in teaching or 
by a combination of these considerations " ; but this is im- 
mediately negatived by the next sentence in which a new 
consideration, that of sex, is given an insulting and, to the 
women teachers, degrading prominence, in that it is made 

23 



24 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the basis for dividing tEe salary schedule for the same 
grade and class of work into two unfair and inequitable 
listSo 

Horace E. Deming at one of our mass meetings said: 
** It needs no argument to convince any sane and reason- 
able person that a man or a woman, a city or a state, a 
corporation or an individual— any employer — that pays A 
a different price from B for doing the same work, is guilty 
of a mean act. Now, there is something inexpressibly 
mean in according treatment to a woman which one would 
not even contemplate in the case of a maUo If the salar- 
ies of men teachers are too high, reduce them to the same 
figure as that paid to the women teachers. If the women 
are receiving too little pay, raise it to that of the men 
teachers. If neither is being justly paid, find a fair and 
equitable salary, hut tmder all circumstances pay the same 
price for the same work, irrespective of the sex of the 
worker." 

When one considers that this is the twentieth century 
and that the struggle set forth in these pages is being 
fought by women, by women in America, by women of 
the greatest city in America, one is forced to doubt the 
much vaunted superiority of American men in their deal- 
ings with their women. 

Yet we have been fighting for years to get simple jus- 
tice for some of our women. " But," you say, " maybe 
these women are unworthy." Worthy or unworthy, they 
the entitled to justice; but it happens they are amongst 
our most worthy citizens. I believe that if the Mayor were 
asked to tell which of the city's servants he could spare 
least for all time, he would say the women teachers. 

Is it not hard then to believe that four years have 
passed since we pointed out the injustice under which we 
are laboring, and that 15,000 of us are still appealing to 
the properly constituted authorities for relief. And yet 
we are not discouraged. We believe that the great major- 
ity of the citizens and taxpayers — fathers and mothers, 
brothers and sisters, of the 700,000 pupils in our public 
schools — will support and strengthen our appeal to our 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 25 

Board of Education, our Board of Estimate and Appor- 
tionment, and — if need be — to " Albany." 

And what is this appeal of ours? 

Simply that our salary schedules be Civil Service sched- 
ules: that there be but one salary for one and the same 
position whose incumbent is selected from an eligible list 
after competitive examination — in more familiar terms, 
" Equal Pay for Equal Work." 

Nor is this some wonderful, new idea of 'the women 
teachers. 

The State as an employer pays but one salary for one 
and the same position. 

The City as an employer pays but one salary for one 
and the same position. 

The Board of Education as an employer pays but one 
salary for one and the same position under most of its 
schedules. 

1. Vacation Schools. Principals and teachers. 

2. Evening Schools. Principals and teachers. 

3. Principals High Schools. 

4. District Superintendents. 

5. Assistant Directors of Special Subjects. 

6. Model teachers, Training School for Teachers. 

7. Principal of Model School. 

8. Principal of Training School for Teachers, 

9. Evening Recreation Centers. Principals and teach- 
erso 

10. Vacation Play Grounds. Principals and teachers. 

11. City Superintendent. 

12. Associate City Superintendent. 

13. Board of Examiners. 

GENERAL OUTLINE 

"Certainly, have the women, but not because they are 
cheaper. If women are put in the subway ticket offices, 
they must have equal pay with the men." 

Mr. William G. McAdoo, President of the Hudson River 
Tunnels, spoke as above when his general superintendent 



26 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

suggested the employment of women as ticket sellers on 
the ground that besides being more expert than men, they 
would be cheaper also. 

When later questioned by a reporter, Mr. McAdoo said 
among other things: 

" I am not a champion for the great suffrage cause, but 
when Mr. Munger told me that women as ticket sellers 
were more nimble-fingered, more expert than men, I told 
him to take them on at full pay. The day is here when 
it is a necessity for large numbers of women to be em- 
ployed outside the home, and it is only fair that there 
should be no discrimination in the matter of pay. Work is 
work, no matter who accomplishes it, and if women can 
do as well as men, they should have the same money." 

Thus are the chains that have hampered women through 
all the centuries being broken by force of light. Forged 
by brute strength, pride, prejudice and passion, they are 
disappearing of their own rottenness. Mankind is real- 
izing and is acknowledging that the parts played by the 
mother, the wife, and the sister in the game of life are 
often as important as those played by the father, the hus- 
band and the brother. In the world of work, it was so 
long taken for granted that the wom.an of the family should 
work " from sun to sun " in the dairy, the kitchen, the 
nursery, the field, the sewing-room, and at the spinning 
wheel, without pecuniary reward that when she appeared 
to work side by side with men in the public labor market, 
it was natural that any wages greater than nothing seemed 
munificent reward for her services. The woman, used to 
being treated as a slave or a plaything, accepted her 
smaller wage without murmur. But Progress never really 
stops on her upward path, though she sometimes seems to 
lose her way, and within the last decade or two vast strides 
have been made in the movements to better the conditions 
surrounding women who must work in the public mart. 
Thinking men realize that their own protection as labor 
units demands the removal of conditions which make them 
compete with cheap labor. That this competition is a men- 
ace to the men is shown over and over again in the appor- 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 2; 

tionment of our teachers. Recently 200 women and only, 
three men were appointed from the License No, i list. When 
the Chairman of the Committee on Elementary Schools 
was appealed to by the men for an explanation as to why 
more men were not appointed, he said in effect it was be- 
cause women are cheapen 

" Work is work, no matter who accomplishes it, and if 
women can do as zvell as men they should have the same 
pay/' 

Mr. McAdoo has in these words voiced the slogan of 
the women teachers of the City of New York in their fight 
for a revision of the salary schedules. When the Mayor, 
the members of the Board of Education, and the members 
of the Board of Estimate and Apportionment of this great 
city hold the same just view of work and pay as does Mr. 
McAdoo, then indeed will the women teachers' fight be 
won. 

" But," say the opponents of the women teachers, " it 
is not justice, but more money the women want." And 
apparently we have found it impossible to change this view 
in the minds of the male teachers and the members of the 
Board of Education that oppose us. Yet when the Inter- 
borough Association of Women Teachers submitted to its 
members the question : Would you support a bill * providing 
an increase of 40 per cent in yonr salary hut not embody- 
ing the principle of " Equal Pay," " No " formed 994 per 
cent of all the answers received. 

The editor of the New York Sun, however, has shown 
that he understands the aim of women teachers in their 
campaign, in the following editorial on " The Equal Pay 
Veto" published May 15, 1909: 

" Emphasis is laid by his Honor on the fact that, ac- 
cording to certain experts, the proposed change would add 
$6,000,000 a year to the budget. But, in spite of the other 

* Such a bill was introduced in 1907 by Assemblyman Francis 
(Rep.), at the request of a man receiving $2400, as assistant to 
principal, though serving as principal of a school of seven classes, 
ranging in grade from Kindergarten to 3B. Needless to say, the 
bill provided an increase for him also. 



28 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

fact that this side of the question was aired at the hearing, 
and on other occasions, it is clear that it is a very weak 
argument. ' Give us justice. That is all we ask,' say the 
women. * Oh, but it would be so expensive,' say the men. 
A very lame and ridiculous rejoinder. Besides, sordid as 
the defense is, it would be more conclusive if we lived in 
a city and state in which strict economy was regarded as 
one of the things earnestly sought after by persons in of- 
fice. 

" Well, the ladies don't get the money, not just yet. 
They must go on paying a tax on the accident of birth. 
They may command in the schoolroom, but, when the time 
for remuneration comes around, must realize that in this 
best regulated of all possible worlds, doublet and hose is 
superior to petticoat. 

" Now, in a case like this, the main thing is to get at- 
tention. The women court inquiry, investigation. From 
the beginning their appeal has been to the record of the 
work done. The mayor announces that he will appoint a 
commission to investigate the whole question in all its as- 
pects. It is safe to predict this will cause jubilation in 
the camp of the women and gloom among the men in the 
department. 

" In the meantime, the opponents of the measure might 
cast about for some new arguments, for there is reason to 
believe that they will be needed before long." 

I quote the above because it expresses the facts so suc- 
cinctly. It is a recognition of the truth that not only jus- 
tice, but all arguments worth while are on the side of the 
women teachers. Ours is a question of justice — ^not of 
religion or prejudice or money. Yet there are many who 
;claim that the opposition in some instances is racial, in 
others, religious. If we were to consider such criticism 
seriously, we would need to imagine ourselves back in the 
Middle Ages, centuries before our great wars of the Revo- 
lution and the Rebellion had been fought and won, instead 
of right here in the imperial city of imperial America in 
the twentieth century. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 29 

But Mr. McAdoo and the editor of the Sun do not stand 
alone. One of the most prominent judges in the United 
States, Hon. William J. Gaynor of the Appellate Division 
of the Supreme Court of New York, presided at a mag- 
nificent mass meeting" held on behalf of the women teach- 
ers and spoke earnestly on the worthiness of their cause. 
Other judges of the same court, Hon. John Woodward 
and Hon. Luke D. Stapleton, presided at the first and sec- 
ond annual banquets of our great organization, and not 
only honored us by their presence, but strengthened our 
cause by their splendid addresses. 

It would be a herculean task to name all the prominent 
men and women who have publicly espoused our cause, to 
say nothing of the thousands upon thousands of noble men 
and women who are ot in the "prominent" class, but 
whose encouragement has been very sweet, and whose as- 
sistance has been very valuable to us. 

The remarkable majorities given our " Equal Pay " bills 
by Senate and Assembly of 1907, 1908, and 1909, have been 
striking evidence of the strength and popularity of our 
cause. Senator Horace White, the " father" of the 
" White Bill " of 1907 and of 1908, became the Lieutenant- 
Governor of 1909. Senator Gledhill, the father of the 
" 1909 " bill, was honored by appointment to a place on 
the Legislative Committee authorized to report on the pro- 
posed new charter for this city. Senator Thomas F. Grady 
has never missed an opportunity of supporting our cause. 
Our first bill was introduced by Senator Patrick H. Mc- 
Carren (Dem.). This bill was not reported out by the 
Cities' Committee, the so-called " White Bill " being pre- 
pared and reported out instead. The Assembly bills of 
1907 and 1908 were both fathered by Hon. Robert S. Conk- 
lin (Rep.), that of 1909 by Hon. James A. Foley (Dem.). 
Both Secretary of State John S. Whalen (Dem. and Ind.) 
and Secretary of State Samuel S. Koenig (Rep.) have 
rendered us valuable aid. Our bitterest opponents in Sen- 
ate and Assembly, Senator Travis and Assemblyman Lee, 
have both said they believed in " Equal Pay," but have op- 
posed our bill on account of its cost in dollars and cents. 



30 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

What would have been thought of the colonist of 1775 
who said he believed in the principle of " Taxation with- 
out Representation " but objected to the cost in pence of 
the tax on tea ? We can feel respect for the man who, op- 
poses our bill because he is, on account of heredity, en- 
vironment, mode of life, or some disappointment in mother, 
sister, wife or sweetheart, still of the opinion that a woman 
even when she does a piece of work as well as a man, 
should be paid less than a man simply and solely because 
she is a woman ; but what respect can one have for him 
who says he believes a request is just, but refuses to grant 
it because it might cost each taxpayer one cent more on 
every thousand cents of the assessed valuation of his tax- 
able property? Can such a one be a true icitizen of the 
United States? 

" But," some may ask, " why have the women teachers 
of the city of New York carried their fight to Albany. 
Why have they not appealed to their own Board of Educa- 
tion? To their own Board of Estimate and Apportion- 
ment ? To their own Board of Aldermen ? " 

We answer : We have done all these things. We or- 
ganized as " The Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers " in April, 1906, and at once formally and re- 
spectfully petitioned our Board of Education to revise the 
salary schedules so that teachers occupying the same posi- 
tion would receive the same pay. Our request was never 
acknowledged, but we learned through the minutes of a 
subsequent meeting of the board that the Committee on 
By-Laws and Legislation, to which our communication had 
been referred, asked " to be excused from further con- 
sideration of the matter." 

We then began systematic work with the individual mem- 
bers of both the Board of Education and the Board of 
Estimate. In the interviews with these members, we 
found that few, if any, realized the enormity of the dis- 
crimination against women teachers in the present salary 
schedules. The mayor, George B. McClellan, persistently 
refused to grant an interview to me or any other member 
or any committee of our organization. This attitude 




Hon. Patrick H. McCarren, 
Father of First "Equal Pay" Bill Ever Introduced. Feb. 6, 
1907. Strong, Faithful, Steadfast Friend of the Women 
Teachers. Died October, 1909. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 31 

caused us much chagrin, disappointment, and sorrow; 
especially as we knew that members of the Board of Edu- 
cation, our strongest opponent, had access to his presence 
and his attention. We — in our simplicity, shall it be 
said? — felt that he was our mayor as much as he theirs, 
even though we were women and they were men ; for are 
we not all citizens of the municipality over which he pre- 
sided? Yet here is an organization comprising over 
twelve thousand of the women selected to be educators 
of the city's children, denied a word with the chief execu- 
tive of that city, either as mayor or as President of the 
Board of Estimate and Apportionment. 

In contrast to this attitude of the mayor, the Board of 
Aldermen had each year of our fight unanimously adopted 
a resolution in favor of the women teachers. 

In the fall of 1906, a second appeal for a hearing was 
sent to the Board of Education, and this time the By-Law 
Committee fixed a date for such a hearing. Tzvo of the 
five members of this committee and no other of the forty- 
six members of the board attended. It was evident that 
the plea of the women teachers fell on stony ground. 

The work of this year made it clear to the women teach- 
ers that they themselves must go to Albany, the state cap- 
ital, and seek the amendment to Section 1091 of the char- 
ter, which would eliminate therefrom the words " male " 
and " female " and cause teachers to be paid according to 
the position held and not according to their sex. Yet 
many citizens have criticized us for so doing. Person- 
ally, I see no good reason why the women teachers should 
not appeal to their legislators at Albany for relief from 
an injustice that was legalized by chapter four hundred 
and sixty-six of the laws of 1900. Governor Hughes in 
his veto message on our bill justified such appeal in these 
words: "The board of education is thus directly subject 
to the control of the Legislature, and whatever provisions 
may be found necessary or wise for the purpose of defin- 
ing its powers or prescribing its policy, must be prescribed 
by the Legislature. No other authority is competent to- 
make such provision," Therefore, it is proven that while 



32 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

we had shown courtesy to our home officials in applying 
to them for relief, we might as reasonably have applied 
to the ice man for a ton of hay. 

The campaign of 1907 was carried on mainly at Albany. 
The " Equal Pay " bill reported out by the Senate Cities' 
Committee, and familiarly known as the " White Bill," 
passed the Senate with a vote of 45 to i, and the Assem- 
bly with a vote of 105 to 15. It was bitterly opposed by 
the Board of Education and some male principals and 
teachers. We expected Mayor McClellan to veto it. He 
did. It was re-passed by the Senate and Assembly with 
votes of 37 to 9 and 82 to 55 respectively. We did not 
expect Governor! Hughes' veto, because we believed him to 
be a lover of justice and thought he would see that justice 
demanded this change in the state law. His veto ended 
the campaign of 1907. 

The campaign of 1908 was also carried on at Albany. 
The White Bill again passed the Senate with more than a 
two-thirds vote, but was killed in the Committee on Rules 
of the Assembly. Apparently, the chairman of the New 
York County Republican Committee had more influence 
with the Rules Committee than did the Assembly itself, 
because although 104 of the 150 members of the Assembly 
signed a petition requesting that committee to report our 
bill out, their prayer availed naught. Furthermore, I was 
told that if the petition were signed by every member ex- 
cept the five forming the Committee on Rules, the bill 
would not be reported out on account of the approaching 
gubernatorial election. It was evident that the power of 
an organization comprising 12,000 women was given seri- 
ous consideration. And so ended the campaign of 1908. 
We were encouraged by the indubitable evidence that had 
political exigencies not been in the way, our bill would 
have again passed the Legislature. 

The campaign of 1909 had two new features — the " Con- 
ciliation Committee " and the Charter Revision Commis- 
sion. The Conciliation Committee consisted of seven men 
and seven women, four of whom — two men and two women 
— were not members of the supervising or teaching force. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 33 

Of the " outsiders," the two men were ex-presidents of 
the Board of Education, while one of the women was a 
member of a local school board and the other of the Pub- 
lic Education Society. The report of this committee; 
signed by twelve of its members — 'the other two, both Man- 
hattan male teachers, having resigned — became the text 
of the bill of 1909. 

The legislative campaign of this year was shorty because 
it was not until after we learned definitely that the new 
charter was not to become law this session, that the "" Equal 
Pay " bill was introduced. It was passed in the Senate by 
a vote of 38 to 3, and in the Assembly by 126 to 140 

This year we did not expect the mayor's vetOo We be- 
lieved that both the mayor and the 'governor would study 
the history of this bill, would note its final vote in the Leg- 
islature after three years of public agitation both here and 
at Albany, would consider the number of members elected 
and re-elected after voting in favor of the women teach- 
ers, would appreciate the fact that many thousands of tax- 
payers had signed petitions in favor of the " Equal Pay " 
bills, would compare the judges, rabbis, ministers, priests, 
lawyers, business men and others speaking and writing in 
favor of the women teachers' cause, with the members of 
the Board of Education and of the male teaching force 
opposing these bills, and that they would consider such a 
demand from the people superior to any personal or private 
demand in connection with this legislation. 

But the mayor did veto the bill. However, he recog- 
nized the importance of a matter which had for nearly four 
years demanded and received public attention by provid- 
ing for a commission to investigate the question of teach- 
ers' salaries. That the dignity of our cause was also rec- 
ognized is indicated by the personnel of the commission 
appointed : Hon. Joseph H, Choate, Mr. W. C. Brown, 
President of the New York Central Railroad, and Prof. 
John Bates Clark, of Columbia University. Mr. Choate 
declined the appointment and Mr. Brown at first accepted, 
but later resigned. Their places were filled by the ap- 
pointment of Gustav Schwab, President of the North Ger- 



34 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

man Lloyd Steamship Company, and Charles Hallam Keep, 
President of the Knickerbocker Trust Company. Their 
report submitted in December, 1909, decided nothing, and 
added nothing new to the discussion, but made much of 
the " Law of Supply and Demand." 

On December 17, 1909, a great mass meeting was held 
in Carnegie Hall, Hon. Mirabeau L, Towns presiding, 
which unanimously and enthusiastically adopted a resolu- 
tion providing for Equal Pay in instalments covering five 
years, which was approved by Mayor McClellan in a let- 
ter in which he condemned the application of " the harsh 
rule of the commercial world — law of supply and de- 
mand " to " a condition so different from the average prob- 
lems of daily life." 

On December 22, 1909, a similar resolution was intro- 
duced in the Board of Education by Commissioner Arthur 
S. Somers, and hence is now called the " Somers' Resolu- 
tion." 

The introduction of this resolution by Commissioner 
Somers marks a great speech in our history — ^the [champion- 
ing of our cause by one of the members of our own 
board. 

January i, 1910, a new Board of Estimate came into 
power, and one of its earliest acts was to authorize the ap- 
pointment of a new commission on teachers' salaries, on 
a resolution offered by Hon. John Purroy Mitchell, Presi- 
dent of the Board of Aldermen, which provided that the 
commission consist of five members, two to be appointed 
by the mayor — Hon. William J. Gaynor, two by the comp- 
troller — Hon. William A. Prendergast, and one by the 
President of the Board of Aldermen. 

The following have been named: Mrs. Frank H. Coth- 
•ren, Mr. Clinton L. Rossiter, Dr. Lee K. Frankel, Mr. 
Leonard P. Ayres, Mr. James M. Gifford. 

We court inquiry along pertinent lines. The women 
teachers have nothing to fear from an investigation. We 
believe that the more thoroughly and more widely the mat- 
ter is understood, the better it is for us. There is always, 
however, the danger that a commission will deal with a 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 35 

live, concrete problem as if it were a dead, abstract one. 
We would like the members of this commission to visit 
the schools, and see the teachers at work, we would like 
them to have the power to put those whom they call before 
them on oath, and to be sure that they were dealing with 
facts, not opinions ; with conditions, not theories. 

We consider all inquiries as to our " needs " as not per- 
tinent. We hold that if the daughter of a millionaire, or 
even Hetty Green herself, should qualify and secure a 
position as teacher in our public schools, the city should 
pay her according to the position it permits her to hold, 
regardless of her " needs " as compared with those of other 
teachers, either male or female. Let it not be forgotten 
that 99 per cent of the women who work are doing so, 
because through inability, indifference, dissipation, illness, 
or death, some man — father or husband or brother — ^has 
made it necessary. And shall we be called upon to pub- 
lish these facts? For instance, I know a teacher, ill her- 
self, who pays the board of an insane uncle so that her 
mother's brother may not become a charge on the state. 
Should she be called upon to tell this? Has it any just 
bearing on the amount of money the [city should pay her 
for teaching some of its children? 

Meantime, we have been greatly encouraged by the at- 
titude of the Charter Revision Committees. The Ivins 
Commission, 1908-9, provided for " like salaries " for 
" like positions." The Legislative Charter Commission — ■ 
1909 — recommended " The classes and grades and salaries 
of each class and grade of members of the supervising and 
teaching staff's shall be fixed with regard to the duties and 
responsibilities of the position and the fitness and experi- 
ence of the appointee thereto or incumbent therein, irre- 
spective of sex." 

The Legislative Charter Commission bill — 1910 — con- 
tained a similar clause in parentheses with a note explaining 
that the vote as to whether or not it should be included in 
final report to Legislature, was a tie. 

This clause was eliminated by the Assembly Cities Com- 
mittee under the influence of Mr. Warren I. Lee, but on 



36 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

May 23, 1910, was restored by the Assembly at the request 
of Mr. A. E. Smith, by a vote of 78 to 12. 

Among the prominent advocates of " Equal Pay " we 
quote Mr. J. Edward Swanstrom : " The contention of the 
women teachers is that they are fighting for a principle 
and not merely for an increase in salaries. This principle 
may be briefly stated to be ' equal pay for equal work/ 
that is to say, for work of a given position women shall re- 
ceive pay with men. This principle prevailed during the 
many years that I was President of the Brooklyn Board 
of Education, and there is much to be said in its favor. 
To pay a woman teacher a salary of $1,000 for doing the 
same kind of work — and doing it as well — for which a 
male teacher receives a salary of $1,500, seems very much 
like imposing a tax of $500 upon the woman teacher, 
merely because she is a woman. Miss Strachan, the able 
leader of the women teachers in their equal-pay crusade, 
characterizes such discrimination as degrading." 

We point with pleasure to the following extract from 
the minutes of the Board of Education, City of New York, 
March 2y, 1907: 

" From the Secretary of the City Club of New York, 
stating .that at a meeting of the trustees of said club, held 
on March 20, 1907, the following resolution was adopted: 

" ' Resolved, That this board recommend to the Board 
of Education that women teachers in the City of New 
York should receive the same salary as men teachers for 
the same amount and quality of work.' " 

About the same time, the Public Education Association 
wrote to the Board of Education, telling them that the as- 
sociation favored paying men and women the same salary 
for the same positions, and submitting the opinion that 
the board should do all possible to get the Board of Esti- 
mate to endorse such a scheme. 

The following quotations show that even our opponents 
are in favor of "Equal Pay " : 

Senator Fuller: — "I believe in the principle of equaliza- 
tion as fully as any other senator. I believe women should 
get the same salaries as men." — In Senate, Apr. 15, 1907. 



EQUAL 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 37 

Senator Travis : — " I desire to say to my colleagues 
that I have never opposed the principle of equal pay,"— 
In Senate, 1908. 

Assemblyman Lee told our committee he believed in the 
"Equal Pay" principle; but he opposed us on the ground 
of "expediency." 

Edgar S. Shumway, at meeting of Presidents of Asso- 
ciations, Board? Rooms, April i, 1909: — "I am free to say 
that if the money were under my control, I would see to 
it that the woman who is first assistant in a High School, 
as I am, received as much money as I received." 

Sidney C. Walmsley: — "We do not raise objections to 
equalization." (Hearing before Senate Cities Committee, 
Feb. 26, 1907.) 

City Superintendent Maxwell, in Tenth Annual Re- 
port : — " With regard to women principals it must be quite 
clear to anyone familiaf with the work of the board of ex- 
aminers that it is quite as difficult to obtain women princi- 
pals of the requisite scholastic and professional attainments 
and executive ability as it is to obtain men principals. On 
this ground I recommend that as soon as money is avail- 
able the salaries of women principals be equalized with 
those of men." 

Commenting on the above, the Globe of Jan. 10, 1908, 
said: 

" The Board of Education has found it more difficult to 
obtain women teachers of the requisite ability than it is to 
obtain men teachers. Evidence of this fact is shown in 
the action of the board of examiners, in granting conces- 
sions in examinations to the women teachers in order to 
increase the supply. It has not granted concessions to the 
men. On this ground it would seem that the salaries of 
women teachers should be at least ^ equalized with those 
of men.' " 

One of the most regrettable features of the agitation 
has been an evident distrust of the Board of Educa- 
tion. 

Mr. Harrison, member of board, at mayor's hearing, 
May II, 1909: — "That is our first objection to this bill — 



38 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

a four mills appropriation to the general school fund. Four 
mills on the assessed valuation would amount to $7,158,- 
190 — that enormous sum. This amount would be placed 
in the hands of the Board of Education to disburse, and 
it is quite a general rule, quite the tendency of human 
nature, that anybody having seven millions of money to 
spend, finds some means to spend it." And 

Mr. Stern : — " There has never been in the history of 
the Board of Education any year in which there has been 
any excess placed in the treasury and if this bill passes, 
I can assure you, acting in good faith, there will be so 
many activities presented to us that the taxpayers will find 
that there never will be any excesses paid back into the 
treasury." 

And yet the records of the comptroller's office show 
that on May 22, 1903, the Board of Education re- 
turned a surplus of $1,000,000 from 1900 taken from the 
general appropriation school fund. On the same date they 
turned in $330,000 from the general School fund appro- 
priation for 1910, to be turned into the general fund for the 
reduction of taxes. 

Do I hear some reader ask: What is the cause of all 
this agitation? What is it all about? Let me cite a few 
prominent examples of the " glaring inequalities " and 
"gross injustices" — ^the words quoted are from Governor 
Hughes' message on our bill — existing in the present sal- 
ary schedules. 

Suppose a boy and a girl — they may even be twins — 
have been sent to the same schools, been taught by the 
same teachers, passed the same examinations, and finally 
been appointed to teach classes identical in grade and sex 
of pupils. Suppose both succeed to the satisfaction of 
their superior officers, and appear for their reward. Is 
it not the same for both ? Oh, no ! The one who was the 
boy, simply because of his sex, receives a yearly salary 
$330 higher than that of the one born a girl. 

How long would a woman have to teach a similar class 
of boys in order to receive the salary a man receives the 
first year? Seven years. And not then even would she 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 39 

receive it, unless she had passed the examination by both 
principal and district superintendent for renewal of license 
at the end of the first year, again at the end of the second 
year, and for permanent license at the end of the third 
year. Her record being satisfactory, she would receive an 
increase of $40 each year, until the end of the seventh 
year. Her salary would then be $840, and would remain 
such unless she be rated as " fit and meritorious " by both 
principal and superintendents. Thus you see, a woman 
teacher must teach seven years and pass satisfactorily 
through four examinations before she receives a salary 
equal to that of a man teaching the identical class would 
receive the iirst year. But what would the man teacher 
be receiving in his seventh year? This is indeed interest- 
ing. Instead of an increase ol $40 each year he has been 
receiving one of $105, so that his salary has mounted to 
$1,530. The percentage of increase in the case of the man 
is so much larger than in the case of the woman that the 
original discrepancy of 50 per cent grows from year to 
year until after twelve years of service he receives $2160, 
and she for the same work and the same sacrifice of years 
earns $1080, or just one-half of what he receives. 

Take another instance. It is a well recognized principle 
that the supervisor should be paid a higher salary than 
the person supervised by him. Yet in our remarkable 
schedule of salaries the maximum salary of an assistant 
to principal, if a woman, is $1600, though she supervises 
male teachers who receive as high as $2160 and even 
$2400. Bear in mind that these male teachers are not 
eligible to hold the position she doeSy that she must have 
had at least eight years of experience before she is per- 
mitted to take the examination for license as assistant to 
principal, and that this examination is so difiicult that sixty 
per cent of those who took it in 1907, failed,, 

Again, to be principal one must have had at least ten 
years of experience, must have passed an examination, 
which records prove to be very difficult, and must have 
waited often as long as' four years for appointment from an 
eligible list. Supposing a most unusual case, that a woman 



40 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

becomes a principal in her twelfth year of service, her sal- 
ary of $1750 as such, is $305 less than that of a male 
teacher, also in his twelfth year of service, who may be 
teaching a "baby class," and is $650 less than that of a 
male teacher of a graduating class. Her maximum sal- 
ary of $2500 is only $100 more than that of a male teacher, 
wlio may have a small class of girls in the graduating 
class, w^hile she ma}^ have the responsibility of a school of 
3000 pupils and the supervision of sixty teachers. A male 
principal of the identical school would receive $1000 a 
year more than the woman. 

Such examples as these indicate that a consideration in- 
compatible with the principle that all citizens are equal 
before the law has been influential in determining that a 
position when filled by one person shall command a higher 
salary than when filled by another person, though the 
work is equally well done and equally satisfactory in re- 
sults. 

In spite of the importance attached to the question of 
cost in some quarters, it is a minor consideration in com- 
parison with the equities of the situation. The constitu- 
tion of the state provides that no citizen's property shall be 
taken from him without proper compensation ; and it is to 
the honor of our government in all its divisions that com- 
plaint is seldom or never heard that private property is 
taken without paying for it all that it is worth. It 'cer- 
tainly is not contemplated that in any phase of govern- 
ment, or any branch of the public service, citizens shall 
be required to work for less than their services are worth. 
It would be fatal to the future and the fame of any legis- 
lator or of any man in pubHc life, to advocate a law which 
should provide that a woman teacher in the schools of New 
York City should work twelve hours and a male teacher 
six hours for the same pay. Yet that is an exact equiva- 
lent of what the present schedules do. The principle is 
identically the same as though a law were enacted com- 
pelling her to work two hours to his one in order to get 
the same compensation. To propose such a rule would 
excite derision and contempt. Why should the law now 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 41 

in existence not meet with the same derision and contempt, 
and be speedily amended? 

The Interboroug-h Association of Women Teachers of 
the City of New York predicts that it will. 

Our Association early in 1908 gathered some statistics.* 
They showed S77 women — eleven of them married and six 
widows — supporting 707 others besides themselves. These 
teachers are all women, but the people depending wholly 
upon them or partly upon them are their mothers or their 
fathers or both or a brother or a sister or a niece or a 
nephew. These are actual figures collated from written 
answers to our questionnaire. You see, then, that here is 
an average of two people for every woman to support be- 
sides herself. Now, what salary is offered to these young 
women of twenty-one years of age, after they have spent 
all these years in preparing for the position of teacher? 
What salary is she being paid by the City of New York, 
the greatest [city in the world, with the greatest public 
school system in the world? $11.53 ^ week. A woman in 
charge of one of the stations in the city gets more than that. 
Does the latter have to spend as much money on clothes? 
No. She can wear the same clothes from one end of the 
year to the other if she wants to, and not be criticised. But 
I know when I go into a classroom, among the things that 
I notice is the teacher's dress — whether it is neat, whether 
it is appropriate. She must be a model for her class. Be- 
sides, the teacher must live in a respectable neighborhood 
and make a good appearance at home and abroad, and she 
must continue her studies in order to give satisfactory 
service. 

Another thing that we must not forget is that a teacher 
has to eat and live on Saturday and Sunday and during the 
summer holidays. A member of the Board of Education 
said to me that although $11.53 was not a big salary in the 
City of New York, that a teacher only worked five days. 

* Our experience with this questionnaire showed us that the 
teachers resented — and we felt the resentment was justified — our 
inquiry into their family affairs. A few resigned because of it 

G. C S. 



42 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Well, that is the number of days we are in school But 
those who know teachers, know that we work other days 
and other nights and often all summer, preparing to make 
ourselves more valuable to our pupils and our employer. 
But whether we work or not, we must have something to 
eat and somewhere to sleep, and something to wear on those 
other days. And furthermore, the hours and the vacations 
are the same for the men teachers as for the women teach- 
ers. So that does not seem a very fair reason to give why 
salaries should not be equalized. 

Another reason sometimes given for paying men more is 
that they are needed for special work in the schools. If 
they are, the Board of Education should classify those po- 
sitions. We hear some talk about the need for athletics. 
We shall be glad if the men assist in the athletics. But I 
knew a school of 48 classes with no man teacher except the 
one in the shop, that graduated about 200 boys and girls a 
year, and during one term the athletic teams in that school 
beat almost every school they played with. And I knew an- 
other school of equal size and grade that had three men 
teachers besides the one in the shop, and it didn't 
win a single game — 'because it didn't have any athletic 
teams. 

In evidence of the world-wide character of the subject 
of " Equal Pay for Equal Work," I quote the following: 

New York Times, 1908 — In Shaffhausen the women 
teachers have won the equal-pay fight in which New York 
women have failed. 

Recently there was held in Nancy, France, the first con- 
gress of university women. All classes of public school 
teachers were represented, and many questions relating to 
the schools were discussed, but the most important was 
equal pay for the women teachers in the elementary schools. 

This agitation for equal pay in France is of long stand- 
ing, as on March 13, 1886, M. Goblet offered an amend- 
ment to the law fixing the salaries of the men and women 
teachers at the same rate. But the lack of sufficient funds 
prevented it from becoming a law. Another effort was 
made in 1889 and again in 1905. In 1907 a parliamentary 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 43 

commission declared itself in favor of the principle of equal 
pay for equal work, and it was decided to organize a cam- 
paign to secure legislation on this subject. At the follow- 
ing election this was the most important question in the 
provinces. This campaign has been carried on most ear- 
nestly for the past two years. Societies of university 
women have been founded in nearly every school district 
in France. These have been united in a very powerful fed- 
eration, the secretary general of which is a brave teacher 
of Lorraine, Mile. Marie Gueron of Laxbules — Nancy. A 
huge petition in favor of equal salaries has been circulated 
in all the public schools of France and tens of thousands 
signatures have been gathered. 

" A dispute over the equal pay of women and men phy- 
sicians has just terminated in Halifax. The dispute began 
by the issue of an advertisement by the Halifax Board of 
Guardians for a resident woman physician at a salary of 
$500 a year. Previously the position had been held by a 
man at a salary of $750 a year. The matter was taken up 
at once by the London School of Medicine for Women, 
which called the attention of the British Medical Associa- 
tion to it. The British Medical Journal got interested and 
as a result of its warning the woman physician who had 
applied for and received the place resigned. In July the 
Guardians appointed another woman to the place. This 
woman, when her attention was icalled to the dispute, asked 
to be released from the appointment and the bond of $250 
which she had agreed to forfeit in case she failed to serve 
twelve months. This brought the Halifax Board of Guard- 
ians to terms and established the principle of equal pay 
for men and women physicians so far as they are con- 
cerned." 



teachers' equal pay fight 

(New York Press ) 

" There is trouble about the salary of women teachers in 
New South Wales, Australia, almost paralleling the fight 



44 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

that the women teachers have waged for several years in 
this city for equal pay for equal work with men. The Aus- 
tralian women teachers also charged they were underpaid 
in comparison with the men teachers. The Women's Pro- 
gressive Association of New South Wales took the lead in 
the fight, which has ended its first phase with complete 
victory for the women teachers. An appropriation of 
$300,000 for increase in teachers' salaries was made, and 
the men calmly proceeded to grab the entire amount. A 
vigorous protest was made by the association, but it was 
not until after a bitter fight that it was directed women 
teachers should share equally in the increase. The women, 
however, found argument and persuasion useless, and it 
was not until they threatened to make use of their voting 
privilege in a body that they won their point. Now the 
teachers are going on for equal pay all around, and they 
are confident they will score a second and greater victory." 



WHERE EDUCATION IS WORTH WHILE 

(The Glohe ) 

" Frequent expression is given to the view that teachers 
in New York City ought to be happy with their lot, for the 
reason that they are better paid than teachers elsewhere, 
and that conditions here are better. But evidence is grow- 
ing to prove that these are not the facts. 

" In Argentina, which is coming to be regarded as one 
of the most progressive nations of the earth, education and 
the ' business ' of school teaching is put first of all duties. 
There they do not pay out their revenues for all sorts of 
things and divide what is left among the teachers. 

" The teachers' pay is placed first among obligations. 
After a certain length of service the teacher is put on the 
retired list and her pay goes on till death. As high as 
$2,000 is paid to retired teachers. The close of a thirty 
years' service is made a great event, greater than the open- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 45 

ing- of an exposition or the inaugufation of a governor. 
And New York ia called progressive." 



EXPLANATORY NOTES 

" I. A, W. T." or " Interborough " means Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers. 

" Board " means Board of Education. 

" Board of Estimate " means Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment. 

In New York City, the course in the elementary schools 
covers eight years. Each year covers two grades. The 
first half is designated by " A," the second, by " B." Thus 
5A grade means first half of fifth year; 8B, last half of 
eighth year. 

Knowing that the public would be justified in thinking 
me prejudiced in favor of " Equal Pay," I have used so 
many quotations from authorities of far higher rank than 
myself that the book is almost wholly a compilation. I 
have included many of the speeches made at the hearings, 
mass meetings, and banquets where our " Cause " was dis- 
cussed. I have also letters and articles that have appeared 
in the public press, as well as personal letters. Should I, 
by an oversight, have used any personal letter without the 
writer's permission, I hope I shall be pardoned. I wish I 
could have included every word that has been said or 
written in our behalf, every name that has been signed to 
a petition. We appreciate every one.. 

The book is in six parts. 

Part I — History, story, and some arguments. 

Part II — Addresses. 

Part III — Editorial comment. 

Part IV — Letters. 

Part V — Endorsements: Board of Aldermen, Business, 
Editors, Artists, Literateurs, Educators, Judges, Lawyers, 
Doctors, Labor Unions, Political Clubs and Officials, Re- 
Hgious, Women's Clubs. 

Part VI — Documents. 



46 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

CHRONOLOGICAL SUMMARY. 



" Consolidation " and Need of Uniform Schedules for Greater 

New York. 
Ahearn Law, 1898-99. 
Davis Law, 1900. 
Organization of Interborough Association of Women Teachers, 

1906. 
Petition to Board of Education. 
Individual members of Board petitioned. 
How Much Will It Cost? 
Committee waits on President Winthrop. 
Committee waits on Mayor McClellan. 
Committee waits on other members of Board of Estimate. 
Interborough Association of Women Teachers again asks hearing. 

1907. 

Hearing — Attended by Mr. Harrison and Mr. Stern — Board of 

Education. 
Committee goes to Albany. 
Committee sees Governor Hughes, Lieutenant-Governor Chanler and 

Speaker Wadsworth. 
McCarren Bill introduced. 
Conklin Bill introduced. 
Report of Committee on By-Laws. 
Hearing on McCarren Bill. 
Hearing in Assembly on Conklin Bill. 
White Bill passes Senate 45 to i. 
Hearing in Assembly on White Bill. 
White Bill passes Assembly 105 to 15. 
Hearing before Mayor McClellan. 
McClellan Veto. 

White Bill re-passes Senate 27 to 9. 
White Bill re-passes Assembly 82 to 55. 
Hearing before Governor Hughes. 
Governor Hughes' veto. 
First annual banquet. 
Board of Education proposes increases. 

1908. 

Cooper Union Mass Meeting — Jan. 20 — John Francis Yawger, pre- 
siding. 

Association Hall Mass Meeting — Mar. 6th — Hon. William J. Gay- 
nor, presiding. 

" White " Bill passes Senate 35 to 8. 

" White " Bill held in Committee on Cities, Assembly. 

" White " Bill held in Committee on Rules, Assembly. 

Committee appeals to Committee on Rules. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 47 

Petition to Committee on Rules signed by 104 Assemblymen. 

Second annual banquet. 

Board of Education proposes increases. 

1909. 

Ivins Charter Revision Commission reports " like salaries " for 
" like positions." 

Conciliation Committee. 

Report of Conciliation Committee. 

Meeting of Presidents of Associations — President Winthrop, pre- 
siding. 

" Conciliation Committee " schedules approved by vote of 15 to 7. 

Apr. 6 — Hearing on Educational Chapter at Albany, Charter dead. 

Davis-Smith Bill introduced. 

Gledhill Bill passes Senate 38 to 3. 

Apr. 24 — Third annual banquet. 

Gledhill-Foley Bill passes Assembly 26 to 14. 

Board of Education disapproves Gledhill-Foley Bill. 

May II— Mayor McClellan's hearing. 

Mayor McClellan's veto. 

Board of Education proposes increases. 

Hearing — Charter Legislative Committee. 

Hearing — Budget. 

Dec. 17 — Carnegie Hall Mass Meeting, Hon. Mirabeau L. Tow^ns, 
presiding. 

Dec. 22 — Somers Resolution, Board of Education. 

1910. 

Board of Estimate Commission. 

Jan. 22 — City Club " Equal Pay " luncheon. 

Report of Charter Legislative Commission carries " Equal Pay." 

Mar. 16 — " Equal Pay " meeting of Board of Education votes down 
Somers Resolution 23 to 16. 

Brief on Constitutionality of Davis Law. 

Additions to Charter Legislative Commission. 

Mar. 20 — Injunction against Board of Education to prevent promo- 
tion of man of 5 years experience to Graduating Class over 
the heads of many eligible women. 

April 16 — Fourth annual banquet. 

April 18 — " Equal Pay " clause eliminated by Assembly Cities, As- 
sembly. 

Injunction sustained. 

May 23 — " Equal Pay " clause restored to Charter by Assembly — 
78 to 12. 



CHAPTER II 

ARE MEN TEACHERS NEEDED? 

The question, " Are Men Teachers Needed ? " presup- 
poses others: 

(a) Is there some appreciable difference between men as 
teachers and women as teachers that justifies the placing 
of " Men Teachers " in a special and privileged class, pay- 
ing them special and privileged salaries? 

(b) Are there some special purposes for which men are 
needed ? 

(c) Are men better teachers than women? 

As to the first, I am compelled to state that after a long 
and varied experience as pupil, teacher, principal and su- 
perintendent, in both day and evening schools, I am not 
able to answer in the affirmative except to state that the 
average woman teacher is sviperior to the average man 
teacher in all the qualities that go to the making of good 
and noble men and women. 

ARE MEN TEACHERS NEEDED? 

I think no better answer to this question could be writ- 
ten than the following description of the Indianapolis 
schools by Associate City Superintendent Andrew W. 
Edson, of New York City, which appeared in the Globe, 
March i8, 1910. It must be remembered that the descrip- 
tion is of elementary schools having an eight-year course, 
as ours have, and that the teachers and principals are all 
women, and — best of all — the classes are all mixed. When 
will New York City be so progressive as to do away with 
the Oriental custom of separating our boys and girls? 

Mr. Edson says : " The average work of the schools is 
high. Some of it is about the same as may be found in 
New York, certainly not better; some of it is decidedly in 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 49 

advance. I wish to speak of a few aspects of the schools 
that may be of especial interest to New York teachers. 

" In several schools algebra and Latin are taught in the 
eighth year of the elementary course. These studies are 
offered only to those pupils who show exceptional ability 
in mathematics and language studies. German, as an elec- 
tive, is taught from the second to the eighth year. Oppor- 
tunity is given all pupils who maintain a high standard in 
the elementary schools to gain one-half year's credit in the 
high schools in algebra, Latin, German, civics, and ad- 
vanced English. 

" Civics : — The study of civics takes place in history in 
the last half year of the elementary school course. The 
pupils are provided with copies of Dunn's ' The Commu- 
nity and the Citizen.' The author of this book is the di- 
rector of civics in the schools ofi the city. Owing partly to 
the fact that the plan of the book and the effort of the 
teachers present the subject in such an interesting and prac- 
tical manner, to the fact that some one supervises the work 
closely and supplies mimeographed copies of practical sug- 
gestions to the teachers from time to time, and to the fur- 
ther fact that sufficient time and attention are given to the 
subject, the instruction in civics was the most satisfactory 
of any I have ever observed. 

The great aim seemed to be the creation of an interest 
in community relations and the formation of habits of civic 
thought and action. Teachers and pupils made the subject 
intensely interesting by the introduction of so much that 
was local and personal. 

" Mathematics : The point of special interest in the teach- 
ing of arithmetic is an innovation attempted this year in 
dispensing with a text-book in the seventh and eighth 
years, and the substitution therefor of sets of problems pre- 
pared by a committee of the teachers. The problems all 
bear upon the prices of articles in the local meat markets, 
grocery stores, department stores and the manufacturing 
establishments in the city and state; the cost of running 
the city departments, including the schools, fire, police and 
street cleaning; the local improvements, tax rate, bond is- 



50 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

sues, railroad and bank issues ; the cost of labor and pro- 
duction. The work is a novel attempt to make the study 
of arithmetic eminently practical to the pupils in the In- 
dianapolis schools. 

" English : There seemed to be a general agreement 
among the visiting superintendents that the one distinctive 
point of excellence in the Indianapolis schools is the study 
of English. The course of study and syllabus in this sub- 
ject are very complete and suggestive. Much of the work 
in the seventh and eighth years is of a high school grade. 
In all the elementary grades special attention is given to 
good oral expression. In nearly every instance the pupils 
expressed themselves readily in correct Eng-lish. There was 
a noticeable fluency of expression in several exercises ob- 
served. The attention of the pupils was directed to help- 
ful criticism ; the pupils were encouraged to note the use 
of choice English and the expressions deserving special 
commendation. A fine spirit prevailed. 

" In several classes admirable teaching exercises were 
conducted, as follows : While the pupil was reciting, 
several pupils quietly arose from their seats. As soon as 
the pupil reciting had finished his statement, the pupils 
standing supplemented or challenged the statements made, 
or asked pointed questions of the one reciting. Often the 
statements of the supplementing or challenging brought 
others to their feet. The novelty of the plan, the alertness 
and intelligence of the pupils, and the fine spirit displayed, 
made these exercises intensely interesting. 

" Manual Training : In the seventh and eighth years, the 
boys have shop work and the girls have cooking in special 
shop and cooking centers. 

" In one school a modified course of study is arranged, 
and the boys and girls are given four and one-half hours per 
week in manual training; three hours in shop work, and 
one and one-half hours in mechanical drawing for the boys 
and one and one-half hours in cooking, one and one-half 
hours in sewing, and one and one-half hours in freehand 
drawing for the girls. The work of all grades appeared 
to be planned and carried out in lines eminently practical. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 51 

*' Latin : In one of the schools Latin is made a live 
language. The teachers and pupils carry on the work by 
the conversational method — at least there is the freest ex- 
change of opinions on the part of pupils in the use of Latin 
words and sentences to express thoughts. There is a con- 
stant challenge by the members of the class, with reasons 
for the same, on the form of expression, on the words that 
should be used in each particular instance. 

"Pianola: In several of the schools pianolas have been 
secured through the efforts of the pupils or their friends. 
These pianolas are placed in the lower corridor, and once 
or twice a week, at the opening of the school, the classes 
throughout the building are entertained for some ten 
minutes. The doors of all classes are opened as some pupil 
operates the pianola. The name of the selection is written 
on the black-board in each room so that the pupils may 
become acquainted with the selection being rendered. 

" Men teachers : The question of ' equal pay for equal 
work ' is solved in Indianapolis, as men are entirely elimi- 
nated from the elementary grades, either as teachers or 
principals. All of the classes are mixed, so that no boys'' 
' bonus ' classes are formed. And, if I was correctly in- 
formed, the salary schedule allows the same compensation 
in one elementary grade that it does in any other — a blessed 
relief in the assignment of teachers. 

" I doubt if, all in all, a better school organization and 
better school work can be found in the United States than 
in Indianapolis." 

I have quoted thus fully from Mr„ Edson's letter, to 
show the excellence of the plans of work in all lines, and 
to call attention to the fact that all the teachers and even 
all the principals, are women. 

In March, 1907, the Public Education Association sent 
a communication to the Board of Education, from which 
the following is quoted °. " That the work of the women 
teachers is equal, if not superior, to that of the men engaged 
in teaching in the public schools seems not to be seriously 
disputed anywhere. It is also admitted that the women 
teachers in an increasing number make of their teaching a 



52 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

life work, while too many of the men regard it merely as a 
stepping-stone to be used only while they fit themselves for 
the law or some other profession. 

" On the other hand, the changed economic conditions 
no longer justify paying the man a larger salary than the 
woman, on the ground that the support of a family is de- 
pendent upon his wage, inasmuch as a large proportion, at 
least, of the women teachers are devoting their wage to this 
identical purpose, while perhaps a majority of the men are 
still unmarried and looking elsewhere for a permanent sup- 
port. 

" While, for these reasons, the Public Education Asso- 
ciation approves of the policy of 'equal pay,' it does not 
hold the teachers justified in going to Albany for legisla- 
tion to make the adoption of such a policy mandatory upon 
the Board of Education. Not only is this step offensive 
to the policy of home rule, which in such a matter stands 
for the idea of local responsibility and self-respect, but it 
means the appeal from a body well informed to one less 
informed. The solution of the question rightly belongs, in 
our opinion, to the Board of Education, and we earnestly 
hope that it will take the matter up for the fullest investi- 
gation and consideration with a view to m.aking an appeal 
to the city authorities for sufficient funds with which to pay 
salaries to both men and women commensurate with the 
work done." 

This communication has been ordered "printed and 
filed " in the minutes of the board. 



CHAPTER III 

ARE MEN TEACHERS NEEDED FOR SPECIAL PURPOSES? 

As to the second question, '* Are men teachers; needed for 
special purposes ? " I am prepared to say that if the pupils 
are segregated in different buildings — which, by the way is a 
persistence of the monastic and nunnery ideas of the Middle 
Ages, that I, although a Catholic myself, deplore as abnor- 
mal and unnatural except for those who are specially called 
to the religious life — it would be consistent to select men 
as principals of boys' schools and women as principals of 
girls' schools. But, though our board does maintain many 
separate schools for boys and girls, it does not evidence this 
consistency in selecting its principals. While it is true that 
it has not appointed a woman as principal of an all-boys' 
school, it has put three of our largest girls' schools under 
the care of men, viz. — Wadleigh High School, Washington 
Irvine High School, and Girls' High School. This incon- 
sistency has so affected the principal of the last named 
school that he apparently saw nothing inconsistent in his 
attitude when he attacked the schools of this city as being 
" feminized." 

Another '"' special purpose '' for which there is yet some 
ground to seek men rather than women, is the development 
of outdoor athletics. The education of our girls in outdoor 
sports is of such recent growth that there are not yet as 
many women as men prepared to take up this work. The 
time is not far distant, however, when this discrepancy will 
have disappeared. Meantime it is reasonable to select and 
pay the teachers — women as well as men — who do special 
work in this line. But it is not reasonable or fair to pay 
all men teachers — ^the majority of whom do not give any 
extra time to this special work — extra or special salaries on 
the plea that they are " needed for athletics." I have re- 

53 



54 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

cently learned that tHe Board of Education is paying some 
men an additional bonus extra for " athletic work." This 
is explained in the following: 

On September 25, 1907, the Board of Education adopted : 
" Resolved, That the director of physical training be em- 
powered to designate teachers, either in the elementary 
schools or in the high schools, for after-school services, not 
to exceed one day at a time, for the purpose of aiding in 
the conduct of field days and athletic competitions of school 
children, and that the teachers so designated for such serv- 
ice receive $2.50 for an afternoon or for an evening, or 
for aj Saturday morning." 

On April 13, 1910, the by-law committee reported that 
in accordance with the above the custom has been to desig- 
nate teachers to assist in the management of after-school 
athletics, and to reimburse them for services according to 
the above resolution, but a question having arisen as to the 
legality of paying the teachers referred to, in the absence 
of a by-law making specific provision for such payment, 
it submitted the following resolutions: 

" Resolved, That section 42a. of the by-laws of the Board 
of Education be, and it is hereby amended by inserting 
therein a new subdivision to be known and designated as 
subdivision 2a, reading as follows: — 2a. Subject to the 
committee on athletics, the director of physical training 
may assign persons holding licenses as teachers for the pub- 
lic schools to the control and management of after-school 
athletics; but no person so assigned shall serve for more 
than two days consecutively." 

" Resolved, that schedule XIII, appearing in subdivision 
18 of Sec. 65 of the By-laws of the Board of Education be, 
and it is hereby amended by adding thereto a new clause, 
reading as follows: — (f) Teachers assigned to the control 
and management of after-school athletics shall be paid 
$2.50 for service rendered in an afternoon, in an evening, 
or on a Saturday, this amendment to be considered as in 
effect from and after January i, 1910." Adopted 26 to 5. 

It is worthy of note that the whole trend of our board's 
treatment of the subject of athletics is to lav stress on the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 55 

importance of athletics for boys. Now, I believe that the 
physical development of the girls, the futurq mothers of the 
race, is of far greater importance to the city and the state 
than the physical development of the boys. Moreover, it 
is more natural for boys to play games in the open air than 
it is for girls. Mother often w^ants Mary to " help with 
the dishes " or " mind the baby," when she is glad to have 
John " run out and play." Therefore, I hold that the :city 
might much better be offering special rewards to its women 
teachers who give many hours in teaching its girls basket 
ball, football, folk dances, and other physical training exer- 
cises. 

While I have heard much of the " special purposes " for 
which men are needed, the most diligent search of the City 
Charter and the By-laws of the Board fails to discover 
them ; but Associate Superintendent Edson, in Mr. Max- 
well's Tenth Annual Report, says : 

" One of the most perplexing problems confronting the 
Committee and the Board of Superintendents at the present 
time, is the employment of men teachers. A few years ago, 
when there were many men and few women, on the eligible 
lists, and when the necessity for economizing in expense 
was not so pressing as it is at the present time, vacancies 
were filled by exhausting the eligible lists for both men and 
women. This gave many schools, especially in Manhattan, 
an unusually large proportion of men in the teaching ranks. 
Many of these men were assigned to work in the third, 
fourth and fifth years, as well as in the higher grades. 

" This condition of affairs has continued to the present 
time with no definite policy established for determining the 
number of men that should be allowed each elementary 
school or the grade of work to which they should be as- 
signed. 

" There can be little question but that boys and even girls 
at some time in their elementary course need the oversight, 
instruction of manly men as well as of womanly women ; 
men can teach and manage certain classes and can often 
teach certain subjects better than women can ; and that they 
can be called upon to do certain lines of work more prop- 



56 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

eriy than women can, as for instance, to oversee the play- 
grounds and sanitaries, and to organize the athletics." 

At last, the mystery is explained. At last the "special 
purposes," the " certain lines of work," are defined. " To 
oversee the playgrounds and sanitaries," " to organize ath- 
letics." And it is to be assumed that these are the " special 
purposes " which Superintendent Maxwell means when he 
says in the same report : " — men who are employed, not 
because on the average they teach the ordinary school 
branches better than women do, but for special purposes." 

Think of it! The city is paying hundreds of men — all 
men teachers — from $300 to a $1000 a year bonus because 
a few of them police playgrounds, and a few others organ- 
ize athletics. 

With reference to this supervision of playgrounds and 
sanitaries, I can only say that every woman principal and 
every woman teacher should do her duty along this line. 
I must also say that I have seen poorer results in this direc- 
tion in schools with men than in those without men. I do 
not assume that this is the rule or the probability. It may 
be that the man principal shirks his duty and responsibility 
in this particular the more, the greater number of men 
teachers in his corps. Furthermore, the board insists that 
a janitor engage a matron for the " girls' yard," and that he 
or a male assistant look after the "boys' yard." It is the 
principal's duty to see that the janitor does his duty. Surely* 
then, it cannot be reasonably maintained that a male teacher 
should be given several hundred dollars a year more for 
doing special " police " service for the relief of the prin- 
cipal. 

Furthermore, if it is necessary — mind you, I say neces- 
sary — ito have men " to oversee the playgrounds and sani- 
taries," is it not the duty of the Board to appoint at least 
one man teacher to every school? This it does not do. 
But if it is necessary — again, I ask you to note the word 
" necessary " — to have men for this purpose, the hundreds 
of schools without men teachers or even principals must 
evidence lack of this supervision of playgrounds and sani- 
taries. Do they? I can confidently say they do not; and 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 57 

it is plain that the board is of the same opinion, or it would 
not permit this lack. Even if more of this sort of super- 
vision were necessary, the board might better hire a special 
assistant janitor in each playground than to pay all men 
teachers a large bonus for such purpose. 

As to the boys and girls needing the oversight and in- 
struction of men in their elementary course, I can do no 
better in refutation than to refer to Superintendent Edson's 
own statement on the elementary schools of Indianapolis, 
and to the records of many of our own schools which have 
and which want no men teachers. Out of an experience 
with the elementary school work probably at least equal 
to Superintendent Edson's, I say that there is great question 
of this necessity. Neither do I know of any subjects which 
authorities prove are better taught by men. Again it is a 
question simply of the teacher. But, even should it be 
granted that certain subjects are better taught by men, let 
us be fair and businesslike about it, and let us classify these 
subjects, and fix salary for teachers of such subjects; but 
when the teachers have been selected, let them be paid 
alike, whether they be all men or all women, or some men 
and some women. 



CHAPTER IV 

ARE MEN NEEDED BECAUSE THEY ARE BETTER TEACHERS? 

Are Men Teachers Needed Because They are Better 
Teachers? I don't think so. But instead of setting forth 
some of my personal reasons growing out of my personal 
experience, I will rest content with submitting the opinions 
of others. 

First as to discipline. 

The Evening Sun of Feb. 14, 1908, says, editorially: — 
" The significant thing about the report made by the special 
committee of the Board of Education is to be found in the 
premises rather than the conclusion. The revival of the 
rod is suggested. There is nothing startling about that. 
What is important is the demonstration that conditions exist 
which cannot be met by the moral suasion, which is so 
characteristic of a soft and merciful age. 

" No less than 208 of the principals and superintendents 
in this city are for the rod, while 181 oppose it. On the 
other hand, only 64 women favor corporal punishment, 
while 104 are against it. This may mean that the women 
are more successful disciplinarians than the men, even 
under present conditions." 

The World of Feb. 15, 1908, commenting on the same 
report, says : '* Does the sum of their replies confirm the 
common belief that women teachers are more successful in 
controlling children? That by tact, persuasion and moral 
influence they get better results than men? Otherwise, 
why is it that the men incHne so much more than the 
women to the use of force? 

" This is a fact that the Board of Education cannot afford 
to overlook in reaching a decision. In a way their demand 
for the whip reflects upon the efficiency of the men them- 
selves. They would not ask for it if they knew they had 
succeeded without it." 

S8 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 59 



AS TO SCHOLASTIC RESULTS 

Figures issued by Supt„ Maxwell, bearing on the pro- 
motions to high schools, Jan„ 1908, show that in Brooklyn, 
90 per cent, of the pupils on register in the 8 B classes 
were graduated, while in the Bronx only 79 per cent, were 
successful. In the Bronx 16.4 per cent, of the teachers are 
male; in Brooklyn 10.9 per cent. It may be that more of 
the Bronx boys can win athletic prizes ; but I know that 
any of my readers who have had sons and daughters " left 
back " after reaching the graduating class will not think 
that much of a compensation. In this connection, it is 
pertinent to quote the Globe of March 3, 1910, anent the 
" Athletic Scandal " : " The school which has been hit 
hardest is No, — — , Bronx. The investigation showed that 
the Brooklyn schools, as a rule, followed the regulations." 

There are several, elementary schools with boys through- 
out all the grades that have had no male teachers. Those 
I know best are 3, 11, and 16 in Brooklyn (Nos. 11 and 16, 
since the death of Mr. Lewis and Mr. Dunkly, have some 
men teachers). Through the kindness of Miss Bliss, Miss 
McCalvey, and Miss Black, I am enabled to give the names 
of some prominent men who graduated from said schools. 
Can any four schools which boast as long a Hne of male 
teachers do better? 



PUBLIC SCHOOL No. 3, BROOKLYN 

Hon. Alvah W. Burlingame, State Senator, 

Borough President Alfred E. Steers, 

Ex-Dist. Attorney James Ridgeway 

Hon. William Berri. 

Rev. George Hoyt. 

Rev. Wilbur Caswell. 

Dr. William Butler. 

Mr. Conrad Keyes — Lawyer. 

Mr. Homer Keys — Lawyer. 

Mr. Gardner Dresser, Broker, in Wall Street. 



6o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



PUBLIC SCHOOL No. i6, BROOKLYN 

Frederick L, Wurster, Ex-Mayor of the former City of 

Brooklyn. 
Hon„ William B. Hurd, Jr., Lawyer, formerly County 

Judge, Kings County. 
Hon. William Cullen Bryant (Deceased), was Fire Com- 
missioner of the City of Brooklyn and Publisher of the 

Brooklyn Daily Times. 
Rev. John Donlon, Roman Catholic clergyman, well-known 

public speaker. 
Almon Gunnison, President, St. Lawrence University. 
Hon. Alfred Hobley, Ex-Sheriff Kings County„ 
Clarence Lyon, Secretary of the Williamsburgh Fire Ins. 

Co. — one of the largest insurance companies in the 

United States. 
Morrison Gray, Custom House Broker. 
Clarence H. Wandel, Lumber Merchant. 
Herbert Ketcham, Brooklyn Surrogate. 
Frank E. O'Reilly, City Magistrate, City of New York. 
John McKee, of Cooper and McKee, Manufacturers of 

Refrigerators. 
J. Wesly Rosengaert, Theatrical Manager, New York 

City. 
David Myrtle, M. D., of Brooklyn. 

Rev. Ralph Wood Kenyon, Episcopal clergyman in Brook- 
lyn. 
James A. Sperry, now publisher of the Brooklyn Daily 

Times, and a prominent newspaper man. 
Daniel T. Wilson, Manager-partner of Flandraw and Co. — ■ 

well-known carriage and automobile manufacturers. 

Ex-Pres., Hanover Club. 
William J. Meyers, Manager, LTnion Stove Co., Beekman 

St. Largest concern of its kind. 
T. W. Weeks, Sec. Barrett Manufacturing Co., of N. Y. 

City. 
Luke O'Reilly, Prominent Criminal Lawyer, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 6i 



PUBLIC SCHOOL No. ii, BROOKLYN 

Mr. Seward Prosser, Vice-President of Astor Trust Co., 
5th. Ave.) and 36th. Street, N. Y. 

Mr. Paul E. Bonner, Pres. North Side Bank of Brooklyn. 

Arthur L. Smith, Cashier of Schermerhorn Branch of Me- 
chanics Bank of Brooklyn. 

Barent Van Beuthuysen, Paying Teller, National City 
Bank, Brooklyn. 

Laurus E. Sutton, Brooklyn Savings Bank. 

Blenhardt Burger, South Brooklyn Savings Bank. 

Professor William J. Berry, Polytechnic Institute. 

Wallace Gilbert, Editorial staff of Tribune. 

Doctor Herbert C. Allen. 

Dr. James Cole Hancock. 

Mr. Frank Tyler, Real Estate. 

Mr. James L. Brumley, Real Estate. 

Mr. Edmund D. Fisher, Flatbush Trust Co., now Deputy 
Comptroller. 

Dr. Edward Hopke. 

Arthur Fitzhugh, Broadway Bank. 

Edwin J. Kempton, Lawyer. 

Dr. John Moffat. 

Frank L. Sniffen, Guaranteq Trust Co. 

Charles H. Young, Lawyer. 

Chester H. Beebe, School of Music Director. 

William L. Perkins, Lawyer. 

John and Edwin Watkins, Stationers. 

Fred D. Edsall, Managing Supt. of Brooklyn Academy of 
Music. 

Fred C. Williams, Advertising Agent. 

Orlando H. Jadwin, Wholesale Druggist. 

Lionel Moses, Architect. 

Charles Brinkerhoff, Brooklyn Trust Co. 

George P. Moffat, Fidelity Casualty Co. 

Charles C. Miller, Lawyer. 

Le Roy Harkness, Lawyer. 



62 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Harry N. Kellogg, Chairman of American Newspaper Pub- 
lishing Co. 

Eben Morford, Supt., Home for Blind. 

Frank Williams, Steam and Water Heating Apparatus. 

Walter Quackenbush, Manager of the North Western 
Miller. 

Sidney T. Williamson, Member N. Y. Stock Exchange. 

William H. Powell, Vice.-Pres. Atlantic Terra Cotta Co. 

Clark Howard Great Eastern Casualty Co. 

Arthur W, Forman, Importer of Diamonds. 

Rev. William D. Street. 

95 Fifth Ave., New York. 

My dear Miss McCalvey, 

If you will permit me to say so, your own thoroughgoing 
spirit of fair play was also a great element for good in that 
formative period. 

Edgar B. Moore. 

It is noteworthy that most speakers and writers on teach- 
ers almost unconsciously use the feminine pronouns, e.g. 

Superintendent Maxwell tells a story about a teacher in 
an East Side district. She was going home from school 
when one of the people of the district stopped her and said, 
" Miss K., I cannot help seeing how the children love you. 
You know my Bennie and Rosie? They're in your school. 
You are such a help to me at home. Some time Bennie, 
he say, he won't. Then he quick stop and he say, ' All right 
mamma. Miss K. says I ought to obey you.' When you 
stand on that platform, lady, and say something, it is just 
like when God speaks. Do you know that ? " 

And Mrs. Clarence Burns, who has devoted years to the 
cause of children, says : " It is not only that a teacher's 
mental equipment should enable her to teach in the schools 
— that, on the face of it, is important — but she must have, 
to be a successful educator, a teacher in the best sense of 
the term, a personality that will tend to viplift those who 
come under her jurisdiction. It must be healthful, capable 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 63 

of imparting its wholesomeness, and stability, must radiate 
strength and self-reliance even while her pupils rely upon 
her. Her personality, whether it makes for good or ill, is 
bound to obtrude itself upon the less mature nature of those 
with whom she is brought in contact. One of her pupils 
will receive one impression from one of her characteristics ; 
another will receive another. These, as the single drops of 
water make the ocean, are the particles of " which char- 
acters are formed." 

Some may contend that men are needed for the more 
scientific, more exact subjects. But a study of the *' De- 
partmental Programs " in the Elementary Schools refutes 
that contention. For instance: 

MALK TEACHERS WOMEN" TEACHERS 

Assigned to 8B Mixed. Assigned to 7A Girls. 

Salary $2400.00 Salary $1440.00 

Periods Periods 

Grammar 4 Mathematics 15 

Music I Grammar 9 

Penmanship I Music i 

Reading 22 Study 4 

Study 4 Hygiene and Spelling 4 

Hygiene and Physical Train- Music and Physical Train- 
ing I ing I 

Spelling and Physical Train- Spelling and Physical Train- 
ing I ing I 

Unassigned I Unassigned 3 

Miss Clara W writes : " On Nov. 12, 1909, I visited 

P. S. — Manhattan — a school consisting only of pupils 
of the seventh and eighth years — and asked the principal, 
Mr. , to let me observe his best classes in Mathe- 
matics. The classes to which I was sent were all taught 
by women teachers despite the fact that there were several 
men teachers of Mathematics in the school. 

Miss Elizabeth H. Du Bois, in a letter to the Evening 
Post, Dec. 14, 1908, says : 

" The following is a bald statement of facts and figures 
in which nothing is extenuated or aught set down in malice. 



64 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The statistics are made up from the high school with which 
the writer is most familiar, having been appointed as a 
teacher there in September 1897, the year in which the 
high schools were created. 

With these exceptions, then, and not icounting the annex 
(which has a principal and staff of teachers of its own), 
the departments of English, Latin, French and German, 
history, mathematics, science, drawing, and physical train- 
ing, number 27 men and 49 women who are doing full work 
as first assistants, assistants or junior teachers. 450 hours 
of teaching per week are assigned to the 27 men; 941 to 
the 49 women. The average for each man, therefore, is 
16 hours and 40 minutes per week, and for each woman 19 
hours and 12 minutes. In the academic departments 7 
women and 2 men are doing the maximum work, 25 hours 
per week. 

Turning now to the matter of salaries, the sum of all 
the salaries paid to the 27 men, divided by 40 (because 
there are 40 school weeks in the year), is $1,528.25, mak- 
ing the average salary per week paid to each man $56.60. 
In the same way the sum of the salaries paid to the 49 
women, divided by 40, is $2,111.75, making the average 
salary per week paid to each woman $43.10. So that each 
woman, for doing two and a half hours' more work per 
week receives $13.50 less pay. 

In the different departments a comparison of the figures 
is illuminating. 

In the English department, for instance, the seven women 
receive $100 less per year than the five men. In the Ger- 
man department, the six women receive but $200 more than 
double the amount paid to the two men. And in the Latin, 
although the head of this department is a woman, and there- 
fore receives the maximum salary for a woman ($2500 per 
year), the five women receive $1,470 less than the 5 men. 

Taking into account training and experience in teaching, 
of the forty-two women (drawing and physical training 
have been left out) eighteen hold a bachelor's degree, nine a 
master's, two the degree of doctor of philosophy, thirteen 
have no academic degree. Of the 25 men teaching academic 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 65 

subjects, sixteen hold the bachelor's degree, six the mas- 
ter's, one the degree of doctor of philosophy ; two have no 
academic degree. In experience, the average for the men 
is fifteen years and ten months, for the women eighteen 
years and four months. 

It cannot be said of the high schools, as it sometimes is 
of the lower schools, that there is any difference in the 
grade of work done by the men and the women. The work 
done by the men and the women in the high schools is 
identical in each department, the same grade of classes is 
taught by the two, the same books used, the same ground 
covered. The only difference is that two and a half hours' 
more of teaching per week is done by each woman for 
$13.50 less pay. 

It seems unnecessary to speak of the proctoring of study- 
halls and of the girls' and boys' lunch rooms at recess, for 
these duties are shared equally by men and women. So, 
too, the care of books, and athletics, assigned to certain 
men, is quite off-set by the care of the literary and de- 
bating societies and the various art clubs, whose meetings 
after school must be attended by a teacher. This work falls 
largely on the women teachers. In addition to which, what 
is known as " escort duty " (i.e., clearing the various floors 
of loiterers at three o'clock) is assigned only to women; 
each woman remaining for this purpose ten successive days 
in each half year. 

The inequality of distribution, however, is greatest in the 
physical training department. There are, in the school, 
869 boys and 1719 girls. But, although the girls number 
twice the boys (less nineteen) there are two men for the 
boys and just two women for the girls. On one day of the 
week, indeed, the two women together teach as many girls 
as there are boys in the whole school. The sum of the 
salaries paid the two women is $3,640 per year, to the two 
men $4,690. So that for almost double the work they re- 
ceive $1,050 less pay. 

" These statements may be verified by consulting the 
present programme of the school, the city records and 
those of the Board of Education." 



66 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

And another teacher of experience writes : 

" Why take it so completely for granted that the average 
man teacher can do more efficient work than the average 
woman teacher in developing ability to use knowledge for 
life purposes? What evidence have; we for this except the 
ancient egotism of men that God must, by some hocus- 
pocus, have made them superior beings ? 

" I am a woman of much experience as a teacher and 
supervisor. I have had both women and men teachers 
under my supervision, and I have to admit, I started out 
expecting to find men far more proficient along just the 
lines emphasized by Mr. R. My disillusionment has been 
complete, and I affirm, from much careful observation, that 
men teachers, asi a rule, not only fall far short of women in 
capacity for discipline among adolescent girls and boys, 
but also in skill in arousing genuine mental activity. I do 
not claim that thisi is due to any difference inherent in sex. 
I am not prepared to say as to this. I do say that as far as 
my own experience and observation go, and these have been 
somewhat extended, the average woman teacher does better 
work — including in " better " the ability to develop power 
of thinking in the upper grades than the average man 
teacher. 

" Let him who doubts go as an unimportant stranger and 
visit the classes of women and men in the upper grades, 
high schools, and training schools of New York, and some 
surprises will await him or her, concerning the superior 
power of men teachers for older scholars. 

" This, like the rib story, awaits demonstration. 

Frances Isabel Davenport. 

Brooklyn, Dec. 30. 



CHAPTER V 

ARE MEN TEACHERS NEEDED FOR THEIR MANLY INFLUENCE? 

Those who claim that men teachers are needed in the 
elem.entary schools must prove : 

(i) That the New York City boys who are taught by 
men in the elementary schools are superior in education, 
culture and manliness to those taught by women ; 

(2) That the men in New York City who are graduates 
from elementary schools having men teachers are far supe- 
rior in education, culture, and manliness to the Up-State 
men, or men from Indiana, California, and other states 
having no men teachers in their elementary schools. 

If this superiority be proven, it will go far .toward justi- 
fying the extra millions that have been spent in order to 
give the New York boy some men teachers in the elemen- 
tary schools. 

We are told that these men teachers are needed for their 
" manly influence," and to serve as " models " for our boys. 

Supt. Maxwell, in his Tenth Annual Report, says : 

" Some men teachers are and should be employed in the 
higher grades for three principal reasons : 

(a) "That the pupils may come under the influence of 
the intellectual and moral qualities that particularly char- 
acterize men, as well as under thq influence of the intellect- 
ual and moral qualities that particularly characterize 
women ; 

(b) " That the pupils may be made to feel that culture 
and refinement are noti the peculiar province of women, but 
should also be striven for and possessed by men ; 

(c) " That the larger boys may have guidance and lead- 
ership in athletic sports." 

One naturally asks, what are the intellectual and moral 
qualities that particularly characterize men, and those other 

67 



68 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

intellectual and moral qualities that particularly character- 
ize women? 

Dr. Wm. T. Manning, rector of Trinity Church, in his 
Baccalaureate address to Columbia University, discussing 
the question of larger attendance of women than men at 
church said : 

'' In the first place, men as a class are not more intel- 
lectual than women ; but rather the reverse is true ; and in 
the second place, history shows that the higher people rise 
in the scale of intellect, the more truly religious they be- 
come. 

" The disparity between men and women in religious 
interests is due in large part to the fact that on the whole 
women lead higher lives than men do. Their lives are less 
selfish, less hardened by contact with the business of the 
world, less under the power of certain of the grosser sins." 

The N. Y. Journal of Commerce, May 13, 1909, said 
editorially : " In some grades and branches masculine 
minds of the best order and training are eminently desirable 
to make the education what it should be " ; but Professor 
Smith of London says that every year seems to show with 
increasing conclusiveness that " there is in the great mass 
of cases a practical equality in male and female minds. 

Again, Supt. Maxwell says in his Tenth Annual Report: 
" At that age, however, at which boys begin to extend their 
intellectual horizon beyond the circle of childish amuse- 
ment, it is pre-eminently necessary that they should have 
an opportunity of acquiring thro' imitation the character- 
istics of men as well as the characteristics of women ; of 
following the example of men of character, as well as the 
example of women ; and of seeing in men as well as in 
women illustrations of culture and refinement." 

In a recent report made by the Male Teachers' Associa- 
tion of this city regarding the necessity for men teachers, 
this sentence appears : " And in this connection we plead 
for men who are men." 

I am sure that we all agree that men who are men will 
be welcome as teachers in our public schools, to serve as 
models for our boys ; but, I believe, also, that you will agree 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 69 

with me that the man who beheves that it would be unmanly 
to pay his sister the same salary as is paid to him when 
she does the same work is not the type of man we want in 
our public schools, is not the sort of man we want our sons 
and our brothers to imitate. 

Science has proven that a stream will not rise higher 
than its source. If the boys in our public schools had no 
other models of honor, culture and manliness than the male 
teachers in their fight for simple justice, the future male 
citizen of this city would be a sorry type. 

That the tactics of these male teachers have often been 
despicable, deceitful and dishonorable, the following illus- 
trations will show : 

Having found that their plea for an increase of salaries 
for themselves had no friends except a, few members of the 
Board of Education, and the Board of Superintendents, 
while practically the whole public was agreed that the 
women teachers were poorly paid ; and knowing that the 
Women Teachers' bill, carrying a minimum salary of $720, 
had passed the Legislature three times and had been unani- 
mously endorsed by the Board of Aldermen three times ; 
knowing also that Superintendent Maxwell in his Ninth 
Annual Report had recommended a similar minimum 
salary ; knowing furthermore that President McGowan had 
notified the Board of Estimate and Apportionment that he 
would oppose all increases of salary until the salaries of the 
women teachers were increased, the Association of Man 
Teachers and Principals in May, 1909, passed a resolution 
recommending to the Board of Education that the initial 
salary of a woman teacher be $720. The women teachers 
resented this action as a deliberate attempt on the part of 
these men to- pretend to the public an interest in the welfare 
of the women, notwithstanding the fact that this very asso- 
ciation was not only organized for the purpose of opposing 
the women teachers, but that it had been continuously ac- 
tive and maliciously bitter in its opposition to this day. 

Mr. Maxwell in his last Annual Report says : "1 am 
also of opinion that more systematic and detailed instruc- 
tion is needed to the end that all the children of this great 



70 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

city may not leave its public schools without clearly defined 
notions of a right, of a duty, of virtue, of truth and falsity, 
of right and wrong, of honesty, and dishonesty, of the bind" 
ing force of contracts, and of respect for law." 

One of the most desirable attributes in man or woman 
is truth. But Mr. W. a male teacher opposing the Equal 
Pay bill in the Senate Committee on Cities in February, 
1907, stated that of all the teachers in the system " only 
a pitiful iive per cent." were men ; though the figures in 
Dr. Maxwell's latest previous annual report showed that 
eleven and one-half per cent, of the teachers were men. 

Another desirable attribute is respect for the rights of 
others. But many women teachers have been hampered and 
troubled by the oppressive tactics of their male superior 
officers. This is attested in the following letters received 
by me: 

Received May i, 1907: " In several schools here, notably 

School No. the principal has practically coerced the 

teachers into signing this opposition paper. (A petition 
against the White Bill.) He spoke for over half an hour, 
and in the end, as one teacher said to her sister, ' I felt if 
I didn't sign it, things would be very unpleasant for me.' " 

Another : 

*' The enclosed notes are copies of ones circulated in P. 

S. this week. They were given to me by a teacher 

who is protesting, but who fears lest Mr. should 

harm her professionally. All matter concerning the Inter- 
borough is concealed, and therefore, I, as a delegate from 
P. S. have been asked to notify you." 

Another : 

" woman in the departmental system of would 

like very much to join, but is afraid to do so, lest it may 
serve as a pretext to force her out of her position in favor 
of the men. She is an exceptionally superior teacher, and 
I think if you could give me some assurance that nothing 
of that kind would result, that she would be glad to join. 
She has been thoroughly intimidated by a former princi- 
pal" 

May I, 1907, " told me that her aunt a teacher 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 71 

in P. S. said that the boys in the High School 

are writing notes to the jMayor as taxpayers urging him to 
refuse to sign the ' White Bill.' " 

Jan. 10, 1910. " On Friday, Miss -, the head of de- 
partment of P. S. , Manhattan, called to see me in 

regard to the I. A. W. T. As you are aware, the principal 

of that school, Mr. , has said repeatedly that there shall 

be no member of his force a member of our Association. 
No later than last week, he caused the teachers to sign as 
to whether or not, they were members of said association. 

So Miss and five associates, wish to join unknown to 

him. Please explain to the secretary, Miss Ennis, that 
under no condition can literature be sent to the school, as it 
will be confiscated and the offenders punished." 

Do we want our boys to imitate such men teachers as : 

Mr. X. — bachelor, receiving eight hundred and forty 
dollars a year more than woman teacher of same grade of 
boys, who said to woman he was entertaining at dinner, " I 
couldn't be taking you and other teachers out and giving 
you a good time, if I wer^ getting a ' Woman's Wage.' " 

Mr. Y. who said : " There is a little Miss ' Y ' — now. 
That gives me an additional claim to the position." 

" I said : ' If I were your wife and you held me or my 
baby up as a plea for favor or salary, I'd leave you and 
support myself and baby.' Does a doctor with a baby ask 
a larger fee than a doctor with no baby? Does a lawyer 
present his family as ground for larger fee? Why should 
male teachers be the only people — either in professional or 
laboring — classes to urge their family responsibilities as 
excuses for special salary favors? Consider the matter in 
another light. Think of the woman applicant for this posi- 
tion. She is teaching in both day school and night school 
to support herself and assist in the care and support of her 
family including a sister hopelessly ill of tuberculosis. She 
has to be an 'old maid.' She can have no child to grow up 
and assist her in her old age." 

Mr. Y. " Well, I have a sister who is an old maid and 
I'm glad of it. She helps us." 

Mr. A. who spoke to me one day with his mouth so 



72 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

offensively dirty with tobacco that I had to turn away in 
in disgust. 

The New York Evening Sun in an editorial Feb. 2y, 
1907, wrote: " The representatives of the male teachers of 
this city did not cut much of a figure at Albany yesterday. 
Poor Mr. Wellnesley, he could not help it. There was a 
suggestion of the dog in the manger when he argued as fol- 
lows. 'This bill says that women teachers shall have equal 
pay for equal work, but it says nothing to prevent a woman 
being able to get more than a man.' (Loud laughter.) 

" ' We men teachers want to be protected so we can't be 
reduced.' But for true frankness Mr. Cort surpassed all 
his fellow protestants. He did not mince matters. * If 
this bill becomes law,' he said, ' it will defer the increase 
in the men's pay.' In other words, the self-seeking male 
persons opposed what their opponents called a simple act 
of justice on the ground that it would tend to prevent the 
commission of a further injustice." 

On the occasion of our Mass Meeting at Carnegie Hall, 
the Male Teachers had handbills distributed in front of the 
building which the Irish-American of Dec. 24, 1909, re- 
ferred to thus : 

" If men teachers in some combination are responsible 
for the trashy circular handed to persons going to Carnegie 
Hall, they ought to be ashamed of themselves. After some 
two or three false statements as to what the women demand, 
the circular winds up with the following rubbish : 

" * How is your bread buttered. The cat's paw pulled 
the monkey's chestnuts from the fire. Who's the cat? 

" ' Who is being buncoed ? 

" ' How many guesses will it take to explain this ? ' 

" It will not take many guesses to explain that the City 
of New York is being buncoed by some of the men teachers, 
if this is a sample of the stuff their brains are made of. 
The movement for equal pay will not be retarded by such 
contemptible asininity. 

" The women teachers' claim is based upon justice. So 
long as their work measures up to the same extent and 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 73 

efficiency as the work of the men, there is no reason for 
penalizing them by a lower salary." 

But probably the most deadly danger to the moral nature 
of our boys is that which has been exposed to the public 
recently — the dishonorable practices of some men principals 
and teachers in connection with athletic competitions. Sup- 
erintendent Maxwell reports : " From such investiga- 
tions as I have been able to make, I find that from about 
fifty school boys were certified who should not have been 
certified. I am fully convinced that this certification was 
the result of nothing worse than carelessness. There are 
some instances, however, in which the explanation ofifered 
by the principal is not satisfactory to me. I feel, there- 
fore, that this is a matter which should be investigated by 
a committee of the Board of Education — • — " 

Globe, Mar. 24, 1910: "Principals from about fifty 
schools have been before a sub-committee of the Committee 
on Elementary Schools to explain their actions in certify- 
ing ineligible boys as eligible. When it is considered that 
only about 100 schools competed, in the elementary school 
indoor championship games, the seriousness of the scandal 
is apparent. 

" As has been intimated, the seriousness of the situation 
lies not so much in the fact that a few school trophies have 
been withheld as in the revelation of the ethical standards 
that obtain among some of the principals. For in certain 
instances it seems the principals, with the knowledge of the 
pupils, permitted ineligibles to compete. The efifect of such 
an example on the future moral standargls of the pupils is 
obvious." 

The inquiry, it transpires, was granted. One district 
superintendent, in speaking of the results of the investiga- 
tion, said : 

" The irregularities seem to have been pretty general all 
along the line, and while in many instances it may be 
explained away, in at least two cases there was direct con- 
nivance on the part of the principal in permitting ineligible 
boys to compete.. If they are going to teach ethics and 



74 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

morality in the schools, it would seem they might at least 
follow their own precepts." 

" The athletes, many of whom have not yet reached the 
age of discretion, entered the contests because they were 
certified by the teachers and principals, and won prizes. 
Then they found that they were ineligible to compete, and 
were forced to return the prizes. The effect is most un- 
fortunate. As one of the most prominent teachers of the 
city said yesterday : ' For goodness sake, keep at the evils 
in schoolboy athletics. Of what possible use all this athletic 
movement, if the moral fibre of the boys is to be weakened 
by the knowledge and example of the moral weakness of 
their principals and teachers ! ' " 

The Globe, of March 23, 1910, published an example of 
another kind of moral astigmatism : 

" Charles Kothe, a teacher in Public School 29, East 
126th Street, and Justice Zeller in the Children's Court, 
disagreed yesterday on the subject of psychology. The 
justice threatened to stir the Board of Education into 
activity, and criticized the principal of the school. 

" Several weeks ago Walter Uhl, a pupil in class 

was arrested, paroled and, , principal of the 

school, and the teacher were instructed to inform the court 
as to the boy's parole record. A few days ago the principal 
reported like this : " The boy's attendance is poor, and 
lessons very poor." 

Justice Zeller asked for the teacher's report, and got 
several cards, indicating a fine record for Uhl, who was 
pronounced " perfect " in his studies. The justice sub- 
poenaed K , when he would not respond to a request to 

appear, and in court Justice Zeller yesterday showed K ■ 

a card concerning Uhl. Kothe admitted none of the entries 
on the cards was correct, and Zeller wanted to know why. 

" I made those entries for psychological reasons," K • 

said. " I gave the boy good marks because I did not want 
to inculcate in his mind any antagonism." 

" I am astonished at this revelation," said Justice Zeller. 
" I am going to transmit these papers to the Board of 
Education, and I want to say to you also, Mr. Principal, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 75 

that your conduct in this case has been very unsatisfactory 
to the court. I'll see whether these teachers certify to 
reports correctly or incorrectly with the connivance of their 
principals. This is a disgrace to our system of education." 

And the following from the Eagle of Feb. 24, 1910, 
shows another type of man whom we do not want our boys 
to imitate : 

" The Bureau of Municipal Research gives out some re- 
markable facts in connection with the case of M J. 

D , principal of Public School No, , Manhattan, 

who was yesterday fined by the Board of Education $500 
for absenting himself from the school and devoting his 
time as a commissioner in condemnation proceedings. 
Controller Metz maintained that the penalty was inadequate 
and he declared that the board would agree with him if 
all the facts were brought out in the case. 

Abraham Stern, chairman of the committee on elementary 
schools, objected to Mr. Metz's proposition. He said there 
were no more facts to be considered, because Principal 
D ■ had admitted the charges. 

Acsording to the Bureau of Municipal Research the fol- 
lowing facts were not considered by the committee: 

1. That D for years falsely certified his school pay- 
roll. 

2. That he made false statements to the president 
denying the absences that he now admits. 

3. That he made false statements to the press. 

4. That he was fined one-thirtieth of the amount of the 
fees earned from his double relations. 

5. That he falsely certified to street opening pay receipts. 

6. That he admits having received 451 full payments 
of $10, when he should have received one-half, $5 had he 
not certified falsely. 

7. That Judge Dowling dismissed and rebuked him for 
the worst form of abuses disclosed in street opening pro- 
ceedings. 

The bureau's statement continues. 

" With respect to Judge Bowling's dismissal of D ■ 

December 15, last (as recorded on page 1099 of the Law 



76 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Journal for December 17) the following facts are given 
for the first time : 

" ' Commissioner D , L F , and P G. 

C , acting as commission concurred on awards for sixty- 
two pieces of property, aggregating $245,013.73. Later 

D and F agreed upon preliminary awards at 

$328,356.25 for the same pieces of property, and finally 
recommended for those same pieces of property $256,649. 

This 'boosting' of awards Commission C objected to 

and made a minority report which led Justice Dowling to 

dismiss and rebuke D and F and to throw the case 

out. D 's fees for this proceeding alone will be, unless 

cut, nearly seven times his fine, and, besides, the city 
must spend several thousands more on new proceedings.' 

" At yesterday's meeting Commissioner Stern maintained 
that the Board of Education could not take cognizance of 
the conduct of a school principal on condemnation proceed- 
ings. Commissioner Metz maintained that the Board of 
Education was duly bound to take cognizance of ofifenses 
against public welfare that were a matter of court record, 
especially when the school principal concerned had not only 
falsely certified to school payrolls and diverted school time, 
but had perjured himself by making a false affidavit to the 
Board of Education himself regarding his connection with 
condemnation proceedings." 

Commenting on this case, the Globe of Feb. 24, 1910, 
said : " Efforts were made by Commissioners Metz, and 
McGowan to have a further investigation made by the com- 
mittee on elementary schools of the charges preferred 
against Principal M E. D^— of P. S. , Manhat- 
tan, in connection with condemnation proceedings when the 
report of the committee on elementary schools was pre- 
sented to the board at its meeting yesterday, but without 
success. The board approved the recommendation of the 
committee that Mr. Devlin be fined $500. 

" In its report the committee stated that the particular 
charge was that Mr, Devlin had been absent from school 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 77 

on seventy-nine occasions between January, 1906, and 
Sept. 30, 1909, attending such proceedings, and that he had 
failed to note his absence on the payrolls. It reviewed his 
excellent record in the schools and cited that in view of that 
record and of the fact that he had pleaded guilty and that 
it was his first offense, the fine of $500 was regarded as 
adequate punishment. 

" Mr. Metz declared that he believed that this was an 
instance where severe action ought to be taken. There had 
been a great deal of talk about condemnation proceedings, 
and when a man in the employ of the city was involved 
an example ought to be made of him. It was a bad prece- 
dent to make the punishment so light. 

" Those members of the board who were not members of 
the committee which had heard the trial, explained Mr. 
McGowan, were in ignorance of many of the facts and were 
therefore not good judges. He suggested that an oppor- 
tunity might be given to the members who so desired to 
go over the evidence. 

" Chairman Stern of the committee on elementary schools 
explained that it would do no good, as there was no evi- 
dence. The charges had been read and Mr. D- had ad- 
mitted them. They were as given in the report, and as 
they had been proved it was for the committee to determine 

the punishment. In doing so it had considered Mr. D 's 

excellent record. 

" Mr. Metz wanted to know if the icommittee had con- 
sidered Mr. D 's affidavit that he was not in the employ 

of the city, and Mr. Stern said that it had and that the affi- 
davit was correct, but it was not included in the charges 
as preferred and the committee could not have considered 
it if it had so desired. 

" I believe," replied Mr. Metz, " that there ought to be 
a fuller investigation. All related facts ought to be taken 
into consideration." 

"This brought Mr. Stern to his feet with a severe ar- 
raignment of the Bureau of Municipal Research. There 
were certain matters which they as members of the board 
were not required to investigate. This was not a legisla- 



78 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

tive investigating committee, and it was not its duty to in- 
vestigate outside matters. The powers of the committee 
were limited to the consideration of the charges enumer- 
ated in the charter, and all facts material to the charges 
had been considered and investigated. If it was to be the 
policy to go outside and investigate what teachers, princi- 
pals, and commissioners! did outside of their particular Hnes 
of work it would be a strange proceeding. 

" He characterized the statements being circulated by the 
Bureau of Municipal Research as maliciously misleading. 
That bureau, he said, was probably acting from good mo- 
tives, and it ought to consider that other boards also acted 
from similar motives. The statements made concealed part 
of the truth. For instance, it was stated that on fifty-nine 

occasions Mr. D received pay in two outside positions 

at the same time. The impression was given that this was 
in school hours, but there was no evidence to show whether 
it was or not. What difference did it make to the board how 
many jobs he had if they were not within school hours? 

" Another allegation was that 447 times he was recorded 
as being at commissions at 3 p. m., giving the impression 
that he was neglecting his school work. The facts pre- 
sented were that he was recorded wrongly, for he had re- 
ported at ten minutes or quarter after three, but he was 
recorded as being on duty at three and had neglected to 
have the record corrected. These were the type of ma- 
licious allegations which were being circulated. 

" The committee had extended to the bureau the unprece- 
dented courtesy of having a representative present. He 
attended the first hearing, which was adjourned, but at the 
second he did not appear until the trial was over. As to 

the affidavit that Mr. D was not an employee of the 

city, Mr. D was correct. Were the city not to pay him 

and were he to sue he would have to sue the board and not 
the city under a ruling of the court. 

" The allegations came down to those seventy-nine times 
he was away during school hours, and it was upon them 
that the fine was computed. Allowing two to three hours 
for each of the sessions, it would be seen that the fine was 




Hon. William J. Gaynor, 

Mayor of the City of New York. 
Chairman^ of Brooklyn Mass Meeting Held by Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers, March 6, 1908. He Was 
then Justice, Appellate Division, Supreme Court. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 79 

much in excess of the time lost to the city by the principal. 
The statements of the bureau were made for the purpose 
of influencing the members wrongly. Mr. Devlin's long- 
connection with the system, his high standing and excellent 
record must be considered. He had made a misstep and 
had admitted it. The punishment was sufficient to prevent 
a recurrence of the evil. 

" It was a principle for which he was contending, Mr. 

Metz declared. Mr. D 's record on commissions had 

been traced back for years and he had been misstepping 
during that time. Every one knows that appointments on 
commissions depend upon pull and' a man ought to be above 
that or not be a principal. He believed the punishment 
should be nothing short of dismissal. 

" Mr. McGowan said that Mr. Stern's review of the 
facts had made the members acquainted with the details. 
He did not regard the statements of the Bureau of Munici- 
pal Research as misleading, but as setting forth what they 
had found to be the facts. The report was then adopted." 

Can we expect the boys brought up under the influence 

of Mr. D to have a fine sense of truth and a high ideal 

of honor? 

Is it not conceivable that such loose notions of truth and 
honesty and honor in our public schools must inevitably 
taint the whole nation? If our boys and girls are reared 
in such an atmosphere can we hope for better things from 
them? 

And again I quote: 

" Thieving weighers of the Sugar Trust." There has 
been so much debauchery, such glaring dishonesty in pub- 
lic officials, that we come to hail a man with decent in- 
stincts as a prodigy of virtue ! Is it not a shocking com- 
ment upon our institutions ? Somebody will be wanted who 
will hang a few public " grafters." We shall have a na- 
tional vigilance committee. The same processes that were 
found to be most salutary in San Francisco during the 
early 50's of the last century will be tried again in every 
large city of this land ! There will not be any temporizing. 
Short weight will get a " short shrift." Stealing from the 



8o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

general government will be placed upon the same plane as 
stealing from one's butcher or baker. 

" By that time we shall have reached a point at which 
every official tried and convicted of robbing the people of 
the United States will be branded in some indelible man- 
ner. As Anna Katherine Green suggests in her latest 
" thriller," this brand ought to be put upon the cheek. 
There it could be seen of all men. 

" How much better than a perfunctory punishment ! " 
— Julius Chambers, Walks and Talks, Jan. ii, 1910. 



CHAPTER VI 

ARE MEN TEACHERS NEEDED TO PREVENT FEMINIZATION? 

It is sometimes claimed that men are needed to prevent 
the feminization of our schools. 

This claim has been made by Herr Mimsterberg, Alfred 
Mosely and other foreigners whose opinions must be dis- 
counted on account of their lack of long and familiar ac- 
quaintance with' us and our institutions. 

This claim is also made by some male teachers and their 
friends, whose opinions must be considered in the light of 
their great desire to secure the appointment of more men 
tq teaching positions. Their condition is like that of a. ven- 
dor of jet beads, for instance, who has an over-stocked 
rnarket, and is naturally anxious to create a demand for 
jet beads. In opposition to their opinion, I quote some 
American authorities. The first is Prof. John Dewey, who 
as an American and a scholar, is worthy of greater consid- 
eration than any one hitherto mentioned. 

Prof. Dewey was head of the Department of Philosophy 
at the University of Chicago from the foundation of that 
institution. Five years ago he accepted the chair of phi- 
losophy at Columbia. Pie is one of the best known Eng- 
lish-speaking teachers of his subject, and is Past President 
of the American Philosophic and Psychological Associa- 
tion. 

Only recently William L. Felter, head of the Girls' High 
School in Brooklyn, returned from a trip abroad with dark 
and gloomy views on the American School System. The 
press quotes him as saying : " Too many women teachers 
are at the root of a large part of the evils of our public 
schools," he asserted sadly. " I thought so once and now 
I know it — I have been talking with Alfred Mosely. The 
preponderance of women teachers is swiftly and surely 
feminizing our boys." 

8i 



82 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Prof. Dewey, who has happened to make a point of lec- 
turing on women in the public schools, was shown Mr. 
Felter's published convictions. And Prof. Dewey smiled — 
very dryly — and said : 

" There is no more efficient body of workers in America 
than the great army of its women teachers. They femi- 
nize boys ? Nonsense ! Where are our effeminate boys, if 
you please? " 

" I wish," he remarked by way of casual beginning, " that 
I could happen on some of these effeminate school boys. 
Somehow, Pve never been able to discover them. Strangely 
enough, the people who lament their ascendency, don't seem 
to produce the article. Now, I am so ponstituted that when- 
ever I examine any sort of new theory, I want proofs to 
back me up. Where are they? Where are our effeminate 
boys? 

" The notion that our splendid women teachers are mak- 
ing mollycoddles of their boy students is utterly absurd. 
Why, women themselves are anything but mollycoddles in 
these days of basket-ball and athletic ' stunts ' without 
number ! They'd be the first to despise the ' feminine ' 
boy — instead of petting him into being. 

"The whole notion is an English pipe dream. Girls in 
England are an absolutely different sort from the Ameri- 
can type. They are brought up to wait on their brothers 
by inches — just as they are afterward supposed to wait on 
their husbands. Very likely a course of education under 
such gentle young women would tend to ' feminize ' boys 
— or make them bullies. 

" But Mr. Alfred Mosely and his fellow commissioners 
should not judge other girls by the kind they happen to 
know at home — and then, to cap the climax, implant their 
own preconceived impressions on impressionable Americans. 
That's adding insult to injury. Luckily, the big, common- 
sense majority of Americans prefer to judge with their 
own eyes. 

" That they don't believe women teachers are making 
weaklings of their sons is shown by the multiplication, in- 
stead of subtraction among the ranks of those same 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 83 

teachers. American fathers and mothers want the best — 
and insist on having it. They simply would not stand for 
the great majority of women who instruct their children 
unless they believed in those women. That their belief is 
fully justified is my unhesitating assertion. 

" There is absolutely no reason why women should not 
occupy the executive as well as other positions in the edu- 
cational system. Chicago proved itself more progressive 
than New York, when it placed a woman at the head of its 
immense school system — because she was the fittest one for 
the place. She has done splendid work in the past — she 
will continue to stand for even finer accomplishments in 
the future, because her field is larger. But she is no glar- 
ing, lonely exception. There are probably women right 
here in New York who are as fit, or fitter, to hold the im- 
portant administrative positions in educational matters now 
occupied by men. Fitness should be the only requisite of 
ichoice. Is it? 

" It is perfectly true that the public is not disposed to 
appreciate very highly that which can be had cheaply. The 
very fact that the salaries of the women teachers have been 
kept down for so long is doubtless at bottom responsible 
for the spasmodic waves of discontent with them and their 
works — such as the criticism that they are making our boys 
feminine. For the sake of our own self-respect, in our at- 
titude to those to whom we entrust our children, we should 
not consent to load them with the incubus of cheapness. 

" I believe that women do excellent work in the more 
highly salaried teachers' positions that already exist. It 
has been contended that with all the advantages of their 
higher education, women have not proved themselves the 
equals of men in intellectual accomplishments. I believe 
that they have not been given the chance to do this. Posi- 
tions of responsibility and power have not been open to 
them. They have been denied the highest opportunities of 
scientific research, for example. When they have been 
granted such, well, even Mme. Curie's own husband ad- 
mitted that his wife was as much the discoverer of radium 
as himself! 



84 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" I should like to see more women in professors' chairs 
in our colleges and universities. In the women's colleges 
they have long done work of the highest order. Why 
should they be less able to do such work in colleges not 
devoted entirely to women? 

" Prophecy is rather a foolish and thankless task, but I 
believe that before many years we are going to see women 
occupying professors' chairs in our co-educational colleges 
at least. I am positive that women could do most excel- 
lent work in such positions. Why not? The woman's 
brain and the man's brain are both capable of equal achieve- 
ment. The only reason for the apparent discrepancy be- 
tween the work each has so far actually performed, is that 
one has deliberately handicapped the other with narrow 
opportunities and conventionally restrained outlook. If 
you take two equally healthy babies and tie the arms of 
one of them till both of them grow up, of course you'll 
have a weaker physical development in the case of the one 
who has been bound. For centuries men have been tying 
women's brains and the result is a weaker mental develop- 
ment. That will all be remedied when the bandages are 
removed. And a new one is being taken off every day. 

" I would see the teaching system equalized — more 
women among the college instructors, more men in the pub- 
lic schools. I would have a fair contest of brains, without 
regard to sex. And let the best man — or woman — win ! " 

Also opposed to the feminization theory is Prof. Edward 
L. Thorndike, also of Columbia University, who has made 
an investigation of the high school statistics of the country 
and in the January, 1910, number of the Educational Re- 
view published his conclusions. They are that the influence 
of the male teachers upon the proportion of male students 
is very slight, and that the proportion of boys who go over 
to or even stay through the high school does not at all de- 
pend upon the percentage of men on the staff of the 
school. 

" It always is, or should be, interesting to put speculations 
about education to the test of facts," says Prof. Thorndike. 
" The result often is, or should be, a warning to us against 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 85 

the intellectual crime of giving mere opinions where indo- 
lence is our only excuse for failing to verify them. 

" In the present article I propose to seek light on the 
very common opinion that the ratio of boys to girls in high 
schools, and particularly in the later grades of high schools, 
can be largely increased by increasing the percentage of 
men teachers in these schools. 

" To answer the question, * Do the high schools which, 
while roughly alike in other respects, differ greatly in the 
proportion of male students?'" 

The tables he prepared revealed only a " very, very 
slight" direct relation between the proportion of male 
teachers and male pupils. In 184,000 students recorded, 
the percentage of boys is less than 4 per cent, more among 
the 84,607 in schools with from 40 per cent, to 91 per cent, 
of men teachers than among the 81,527 in schools with from 
o per cent, to 35 per cent. 

" The central tendency is to have three out of eight 
teachers men and to have 142 girls for every 100 boys en- 
rolled. For 33;^ per cent, increase in the proportion of male 
teachers, one finds an increase of less than one per cent, in 
the proportion of male students ; for 66| per cwit. increase 
in the former proportion, one finds an increase of 2 per 
cent, in the latter; and for an increase of 100 per cent, in 
the former, an increase of 4 or 5 per cent, in the latter. 
Where the former proportion is halved the proportion of 
male students drops only about i per cent, and where it is 
reduced to a third, the drop in the latter is less than 2 per 
cent." 

Taking forty-two schools of thirteen or more teachers 
having a percentage " of male teachers of 24 or under and 
the forty-one such schools having a percentage of male 
teachers of 47 or over. Although on the average the lat- 
ter group have two and a half times as high a percentage 
of male teachers, they have a percentage of male students 
hardly any higher and a percentage of male graduates 
which is decidedly lower than is found in the schools with 
few men teachers." 

"Evidently," says Prof. Thorndike, "the influence of 



86 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the proportion of male teachers upon the proportion of 
male students, even when combined with whatever unreas- 
oning tendency there is for school boards to provide a 
larger share of men teachers when the enrollment consists 
largely, of boys and with the tendency of certain communi- 
ties to look with disfavor on feminization of both the teach- 
ing profession and the school populations, is very slight." 

Taking up the equally interesting question whether high 
schools differing greatly in the proportion of male teachers 
show corresponding differences in the proportion of male 
graduates, Prof. Thorndike declares that " the proportion 
of male teachers thus makes even less difference in the pro- 
portion of male graduates than in the proportion of male 
students as a whole. It appears then, that the influence 
which made the slight correlation between the sex ratio of 
the staff and that of the student body was not in the main 
the attractiveness of men teachers to boys. For, in so far 
as it was that, the relation should be closer for graduates 
upon whom the supposed attractive force would have acted 
from one-half to three and a half years longer. 

Another prominent American educator who flouts the 
" Feminization " theory is Alexander T. Stuart, Superin- 
tendent of Public Schools, Washington, D. C. In the Sun- 
day Tribune for March 22, 1908, one of his articles ap- 
peared which was part of a discussion started by G. Stan- 
ley Hall. Following are some extracts from said article: 
" I can read little else in Doctor Hall's article on the ' Fem- 
inization of Boys ' than a plea for the return to corporal 
punishment at home and in school, and as such I believe it 
will have few defenders. 

" It is true that there has been a noteworthy decrease 
in the number and in the proportion of men teachers in the 
United States within thirty years; but that the results of 
this growing influence of the woman teacher and of the 
mother upon the character of the individual boy and even- 
tually upon the nation, are now, or are to be as described, 
I do not for a moment accept. 

" In the reports of the eminent English educators who 
constituted the Mosely commission, which investigated the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 87 

American school system in 1903, the absence of the man'^in 
the schoolroom was repeatedly deplored ; but I fail to recall 
that any of these experts claimed to have discovered in the 
discipline, bearing or scholarship of the American boy at 
school, or in the behavior or achievements of the American 
man, as found participating in the great social, political, 
and business movements of this country, any tangible evils 
that might rightly be traced to the undue influence of 
woman in the education of boys. On the contrary, their 
reasons for wanting more men seemed to consist in the fact 
that men teachers were the fashion in England, supported 
by the general statement that perhaps boys, after a certain 
age, would better be under a man. It is unfortunate that 
this startling plea for the transfer of the control of our boys 
at home from the mother to the father, and at school from 
the woman teacher to the man teacher, by so eminent a 
student of childhood as Dr. Hall, could not have been made 
without his frank avowal that the all too sympathetic meth- 
ods of women must now be abandoned to the sounder min- 
istrations of a ' good stick or ferule.' " 

I quote from still another American educator on this 
point. President James M. Green, of the State Normal 
College at Trenton, New Jersey, in a speech delivered on 
the occasion of the Regents' Convocation at Albany, N. Y., 
October 29, 1909, said: 

" The claim that we should have men teachers in any 
considerable numbers in the elementary grades will not be 
taken very seriously by the parents of the country. There 
are a number of more or less fanciful theories about the 
race becoming effeminated, etc., that are gotten up and 
that sound learned ; but, seriously speaking, there is no 
worry. There are some men who would be adapted to ele- 
mentary teaching and would do it well, but women show an 
especial adaptation to this grade of work, and they do it 
so successfully that the large part of it may safely be left 
to them." 

Coming to the authorities in our own system, Associate 
Superintendent Davis in Superintendent Maxwell's 6th An- 
nual Report says: 



88 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" I am inclined to believe that this conclusion is based 
on theory and not upon fact. It is not my experience, ex- 
tending over twenty-four years, that the boys of this city 
show, either in school life or out of school life, this lack of 
masculine characteristics." 

Dr. Luther H. Gulick, then, Director of Physical Train- 
ing, and supervisor of athletics in New York Public 
Schools : 

" City conditions prevent that precise form of manifest- 
ing the combative element in the boy which is brought out 
in smaller districts where he has more freedom, but the 
city-trained boy has never proved himself to be a quitter." 
Dr. Gulick is of the opinion that most of the athletes in 
this country had received their elementary training under 
women teachers. He suggests that this might prove to be 
true of most of the athletes on the Olympic team. " Theo- 
retically it would seem that the boy who received practi- 
cally all his early training under a woman teacher would 
become somewhat effeminate," said Dr. Gulick, " but the 
facts, as we can judge them in the New York public 
schools, do not justify such a conclusion. The New York 
boy goes into athletics with an aggressiveness and spirit of 
combativeness which is sometimes difficult to keep within 
reasonable bounds. That is our trouble — it is hard for us 
to keep him from fighting too much, and in that very par- 
ticular, I think, lies the best test we have of his manliness." 

On the general proposition of feminization, the following 
is interesting: 

Jno. K. Le Baron, writing for the New York World: 
" Most great men have had noble mothers. Many who 
have attained enduring distinction have been the sons of 
weak, dissolute and obdurate fathers. 

" The story of Cornelia, daughter of Scipio, wife of Ti- 
berius the elder and mother of the Gracchi, is one of the 
luminous pages of history. True, the Gracchi had a re- 
markable father, but, dying when they were young, he left 
his sons to their mother's care. The Gracchi were the 
noblest Romans of their day. 

" The mother of Confucius was ' a woman of rare mental 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 89 

and spiritual worth.' The great philosopher constantly 
sought her companionship and counsel. 

" The father of Savanarola was an indigent profligate. 
It was from his mother that he received his sublime cour- 
age, and her teachings were the basis of his character. 

" Pope, a cynic and a sage, bitter in his resentments and 
cruel in his cynicisms, was devotion itself to his mother and 
owed much to her restraining influence. 

" ' It was to his mother,' says Mathews, ' a woman of 
great energy and rare accomplishments, that Bulwer was 
indebted for the formation and guidance of his literary 
tastes.' 

" Andrew Carnegie, speaking to boys in a school in Pitts- 
burg, said recently : ' Woman raises man to the highest 
standard. My mother and my wife made me all that I am.' 

"Our own great and beloved Lincoln declared: 'All 
that I am and all that I hope to be I owe to my mother.' " 



CHAPTER VII 

SUPPLY AND DEMAND 

I TALKED at the City Club one afternoon, and I believe 
I shocked them very much by not treating this " economic 
law " with more reverence. I said it made me think of the 
vegetable market. When it is applied to men and women, 
it seems silly. I happened to say — trying to be funny in 
order to hide my weariness of the oft-heard arguments — 
the only rnarket I would consider would be the matrimonial 
market. And one of the speakers that followed me criti- 
cised me as being " flippant." I appeal to my married 
readers: Is that a flippant subject? 

One is prone to think primarily of a building — an insen- 
sate mass of matter. But truly, a school is complete with- 
out a building. Wherever there is one to teach and one 
to be taught, there is a school. Some of the greatest schools 
in history were without buildings. But to bring about the 
greatest good to the greatest number, and to put into effect 
the opinion that the welfare of the State depends on the 
education of its citizens, buildings are provided. That they 
are not absolutely necessary to school keeping, however, 
was proven in San Francisco recently, when the city, after 
the earthquake, kept school in open fields while its build- 
ings were being restored. 

Now, of the two necessities for a school — teacher and 
pupil — which is more necessary? The answer to this is 
largely forced by the much misused law of Supply and 
Demand. A State is not a State without a natural supply 
of pupils ; a State may be a State without a natural supply 
of teachers. So that the teacher is the greater necessity to 
the State. 

Therefore, the State must see to it that it get a sufficient 
number of teachers to supply the natural demand made by 
its millions of children and its duty to promote the general 

90 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 91 

welfare. Suppose all the teachers of the State rebelled 
against some injustice — fancied or real — and agreed to stop 
teaching. Can you imagine the condition of the State at 
the end of a week? How much worse at the end of a 
month? A year? Ten years? But it is doubtful if in 
these days a State could stand ten years without schools. 
One might ask, What would the teachers do? How would 
they earn a living? But is It not inevitable that the de- 
mands for policemen, for matrons and nurses in hospitals, 
insane asylum-s, prisons, and other houses of detention, for 
lawyers, for doctors, would all increase with the millions of 
children left without teachers? It would not take a State 
very long to realize how much it needs its teachers — how 
much it owes its teachers. Suppose it was only the men 
teachers that became dissatisfied and gave up their positions. 
Would the State find it impossible to get women to do their 
work? But again, suppose it was only the women teachers 
that left their classrooms and their pupils? Could the State 
fill their places as readily as they might those of the men? 
The task would be far more difficult. 

Much has been written about the decreasing number of 
men teachers in the schools of the country and the threat- 
ened feminization of boys by reason of the large and in- 
creasing proportion of women teachers. Examination of 
the statistics of the Board of Education of this city show 
that the conditions here are directly opposite to those in 
the rest of the country. Here the proportion of men has 
been increasing since 1902. Not only that, the school au- 
thorities now claim that the elementary schools have almost 
all the men teachers they need. 

The report of the United States Commissioner of Educa- 
tion shows that in 1901-2 the percentage of men to women 
teachers in the country at large was 27.4, while in 1906-7 
it had dropped to 22.3. In this city, however, the percen- 
tage in high and elementary schools in 1902 was 8.3 per 
cent., while in the year ended July, 1908, it was ii%4 
per cent. 

Comparing the figures for the separate schools, even 
more interesting deductions are possible. 



92 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

In 1902 there were in high schools 284 men and 346 
women, a total of 630, or 45/42 per cent. men. In 1908 
there were 530 men and 592 women, a total of 1 122 and 
a percentage of 47 /4i men. 

In elementary schools in 1902 there were 10,181 teachers, 
of whom 617, or 6%o per cent., were men, and 9564 women ; 
but in 1908 the total number of teachers was 13,354, of 
whom 1 1 13, or 8j{o^ per cent., were men. 

In his Tenth Annual Report, Mr. Maxwell says : " The 
majority of the class teachers in the public schools are 
women for two reasons: (a) for the younger children who 
constitute the larger number in the schools, women make 
the better teachers; (b) the services of women teachers 
may be obtained more cheaply than those of men." And 
further on he says : " In order to obtain the services of 
even a small number of men, it has been found necessary 
to pay considerably higher salaries than those paid to 
women." 

Yet statistics prove that this " small number " is greatly 
in excess of the average for the United States. 

Superintendent Maxwell's Report for 1907-8 : 

Total number of teachers I,7i77 

Total number of women teachers 15,003 

Total number of men teachers 2,174 

Percentage of women teachers 87.3 

Percentage of men teachers 12.7 

In a speech at the 20th Anniversary Dinner of the Mid- 
wood Club, May 21, 1909, Superintendent Maxwell said, in 
speaking of men teachers, " Ten per cent, is as much as we 
need." 

Why then load up the system with 12.7 per cent., nearly 
25 per cent, more than the City Superintendent thinks nec- 
essary? 

I have enough of the political-and-social economist sense 
to recognize and acknowledge that the ratio of the normal 
or natural supply of any eommodity to the normal or nat- 
ural demand for such commodity is a valid basis for regu- 
lating the cost or selling price of same. But I have also 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 93 

enough of common sense and good judgment to differen- 
tiate the supply-and-demand arguments which are forced, 
abnormal, spurious and inapphcable from those that are 
real and applicable. A mustard poultice is a good thing to 
apply to an inflamed chest, but the most rabid supporter of 
the mustard poultice remedy would not insist on applying 
it to an inflamed eye ! 

Now, I claim that the argument of " Supply and De- 
mand " is not applicable in the consideration of the " Equal 
Pay " question raised by the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers. I base my claim on the following 
facts : 

1. Said teachers are not in the open market; but, on the 
contrary, the supply is limited to those who secure places 
on an eligible list. 

2. The qualifications and requirements to be met by can- 
didates are fixed, not by God's or Nature's laws, but by the 
laws of the State and the by-laws of the Board of Educa- 
tion. 

3. The supply of such eligible candidates is dependent on 
the number, frequency, and regularity of the examinations, 
and is therefore largely in control of the Board of Exam- 
iners and Board of Education. 

4. The demand for teachers depends on the supply of 
pupils. 

5. The supply of our pupils in grades below the seventh 
year of the Course of Study is nineteen times as great as 
the supply of pupils in all grades above the sixth year of 
the Course of Study. 

6. All authorities agree that the best interests of the 
children demand women teachers in these lower grades. 

7. Principals demand women teachers in these lower 
grades. 

8. Superintendents demand women teachers in these 
lower grades. 

9. Our Board of Education provides two regular exam- 
inations a year — January and June — for teachers of these 
lower grades. 

10. Our Board of Education provides examinations for 



94 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

license for higher grades and positions at irregular, un- 
known, infrequent periods. 

The following are but samples: Globe, January ii, 
1910: "It is doubtful if an examination of teachers of 
Mathematics in High School will be held before March 
or April. Probably not for a year." 

Another : " No date has been set for the next examina- 
tion for women teachers of history in high schools. One 
will not be held before next fall." 

Who knows when the next examination for candidates 
to teach Music, Physical Training, Mathematics, Latin, Bi- 
ology or any other special or high school subject will be 
held? 

Who knows when there will be an examination of such 
people as desire to be Model or Critic Teachers In our 
Training Schools? 

Ask any high school principal, any director of a special 
subject, any one of the 46 members of the Board of Edu- 
cation, any one of the 230 members of the local school 
boards, any one of the students in our high schools or 
colleges, any Civil Service Commissioner, any of the other 
officials of the city, any of the citizens of the city, any 
taxpayer, and see if you will receive a satisfactory 
answer? 

In a letter which I wrote to a clerk of the Board of Edu- 
cation in January, 1910, I asked these questions: 

*' Can you tell me when the next high school examination 
will be held ? 

" The date of the last previous examination in the same 
subject? 

" When was an examination for Model teacher or for 
Critic teacher in training school held, and when will the 
next one be ? " 

Following are the answers received: 

" High school examinations are held twice each year in 
such subjects as there is a demand, when the lists of such 
subjects are exhausted or likely to be exhausted. It is 
likely that the next examination will be held about April 
first. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 95 

" The examinations for licenses to teach in training 
schools are held only when there is a vacancy." 

If college graduates knew that there would be an exam- 
ination every June or every September, or at some other 
regular, stated time, when they were free to get to New 
York and take the examination, there would never be any 
scarcity of candidates. 

In face of these conditions, I question the good faith 
of any who apply the general argument of Supply and De- 
mand to the solution of the question which the women 
teachers have raised. 

But admitting, for the sake of argument, the good faith 
of the advocates of Demand and Supply as applied to this 
question, let us try to demonstrate the 

Theorem : The men teachers of New York City should 
be paid more than the women teachers thereof because the 
supply of the women teachers is greater than the supply 
of men teachers. 

Granted: (a) That there is an Association of Unap- 
pointed Men Teachers demanding places in these public 
schools. 

(b) That there is no Association of Unappointed Women 
Teachers, nor are women teachers making any formal de- 
mand for such places. 

(c) That the number of men teachers holding License 
No. I who have waited one, two, or more years for ap- 
pointment is far in excess of the number of women hold- 
ing similar license who have waited six months. 

(d) That a man teacher has brought mandamus pro- 
ceedings against the Board of Education to compel his ap- 
pointment because his percentage was upwards of 90, while 
women with only 70 per cent, were appointed to places for 
which he was eligible. 

(e) That no woman teacher has ever brought such pro- 
ceedings on similar grounds. 

Therefore: Men teachers should be paid more than the 
women teachers, because the supply of men teachers is 
greater than the supply of women teachers. Reductio ad 
Absurdum ! 



96 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Furthermore, the highest educational authorities hold 
that women are the best teachers for the younger children. 

City Superintendent Maxwell is an educational author- 
ity, and Mr. Maxwell states in his Annual Reoort, 1907 : 
" Experience doubtless shows that women teachers teach 
younger pupils, hoys as well as girls, better than men." 

Horace Mann is recognized as one of the foremost edu- 
cators in the history of our country, and Horace Mann said 
he would as soon place an elephant to brood chickens as 
he would a man to teach little children. 

Yet, the city of New York is paying a man who teaches 
little children from one and a half to tivo times as much 
as it pays a woman who teaches these same little children, 
and it makes the woman serve seven years before it pays 
her what it gives the man in his first year of service. 

Finally, we must not lose sight of the fact that the cry 
that men teachers are needed comes from prejudiced 
sources, that is — according to the petition blank of the Un- 
appointed Men Teachers — '" certain members of the Board 
of Education," " remarks of principals," and " statements 
of the Association of Principals and Male Teachers." 
Where is the cry from the pupils? (See Professor Thorn- 
dike's conclusions.) Where is the cry from the public? 
Where is the cry from the representatives of the people — 
the Board of Aldermen, the Legislature? 

Compare the demand for Equal Pay: 

From the people of the city represented by the Board of Alder- 
men. Unanimovxs vote. 

From the people of the city represented by the Legislature, 80 
out of 86 New York City votes for it. 

From the Labor Unions representing hundreds of thousands of 
our citizens. Unanimous. 

From the hundreds of Organizations of women and men. 

From the thousands of individual citizens who have used voice 
or pen in our behalf. 



CHAPTER VIII 

SCARCITY OF WOMEN TEACHERS BREEDS DETERIORATION IN 
QUALITY OF TEACHER AND OVERCROWDED CLASSES 

When we went to Albany in January, 1907, there were 
633 actual vacancies in the public schools of New York 
city. When you realize that that is about the number of 
teachers in the city of Rochester, its significance will sink 
deeper. Imagine the city of Rochester failing to supply 
teachers for its public school children. No Legislature or 
Governor would hesitate long over enacting a mandatory 
law to make her do so. Yet here in our own city, with its 
millions of foreigners, was a number of school children 
equal to the total number of public school pupils in one of 
the first-class cities of this State, equal to the total number 
of public school children in the State of Louisiana, greater 
than the total number of all the people in the State of 
Nevada, without regular teachers : to-day in the care of 
a pupil ; to-morrow in the hands of a male substitute, at 
three dollars a day ; next day in charge of a female sub- 
stitute, at two dollars and a half a day. Is it any wonder 
we have thousands and thousands of backward children? 

And what has the State done about it in these four 
years? Nothing. It is true the Legislature passed two 
bills, one effect of which would have been to increase and 
improve the supply of teachers, but Governor Hughes's 
veto killed one and Mayor McClellan's the other. 

And what has the city done about it? Apparently has 
not noticed it. If these vacancies were all in the North 
Side section, or the Flatbush section, or the Bushwick sec- 
tion, the Board of Trade and the Taxpayers' Association 
of that particular locality would be " up in arms " ; but 
they are scattered through the five hundred schools, and 
so the danger does not seem acute in any one spot. 
Through all our fight, I have heard only one man speak 

97 



98 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

on this phase of the question, pointing out his right and 
that of all citizens to have good teachers for their children 
and emphasizing this need in the case of the children of 
laboring men who may have to leave school early. This 
man was James L. Gernon, speaking at a meeting of the 
Central Labor Union, Brooklyn, at which we were per- 
mitted to state our case. 

And what has the Board of Education done about it? 
Held a special and extra examination in April, 1908; ex- 
tended the age limit of candidates for license No. i ; made 
certain concessions in ratings. 

High school teachers have told me their best girls are 
not taking up teaching. They are learning that the city 
offers far better salary inducements in other positions ; and 
all who know anything about teaching, acknowledge there 
is no occupation that calls for so much self-sacrifice. When 
a girl who is employed as clerk or stenographer or tele- 
phone operator goes home at night, her work is over. 
Not so with the girl who is a teacher. Some may say 
that the teacher has shorter hours and longer vacations. 
That is true, but the shorter hours and longer vacations 
are fiot fixed out of consideration for the teacher, but for 
the pupil. It is true the teacher could not stand the strain, 
either; but if the pupils could, the teachers might be al- 
lowed to break down if that did not also entail a loss to 
the pupil. 

SCARCITY OF TEACHERS BREEDS DETERIORATION OF QUALITY 
OF TEACHER AND OVERCROWDED CLASSES 

One of the inevitable results of a short supply is deteri- 
oration of quality. The demand for women teachers has 
been so much greater than the supply that the standards 
of qualifications and requirements and rating have been 
lowered. Nearly all those who complete the courses for 
teachers at high and training schools have been granted 
licenses to teach. For the special examination for hcense 
No. I given in April, 1908, concessions were made to in- 
duce teachers from outside this city to compete. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 99 

Commenting on this, the Evening Journal of December 
31, 1908, said editorially: 

" Wh}' Not Teachers Better Paid Instead of Teachers 
Less Intelligent? 

" The New York public schools have issued a circular 
which lowers the standard of candidates for public school 
positions. 

" Women that ordinarily would be required to pass cer- 
tain examinations before being accepted as school teachers 
are now exempt from parts of examinations or allowed to 
pass and become teachers on a lower percentage than for- 
merly. 

" The explanation is simple — there are not enough public 
school teachers. 

" There are now seven hundred vacancies in the public 
schools. Seven hundred more teachers are needed. 

" This lowering of standard follows closely upon a fight 
to prevent the women in the schools from gettinp- fair play 
— the same pay as men for the same work. 

" It is interesting to observe the school authorities fight- 
ing against decent pay for the women, struggling to keep 
women teachers on an inferior wage plane, and then invit- 
ing women of inferior ability to become teachers because 
not enough able women can be hired on an unjust basis of 

pay. 

"But this question ought to force itself on the. school 
authorities : 

" Why have you a shortage of seven hundred among your 
women teachers? Why are you compelled to change your 
examination standards? Why not pay the women fairly? 
Wh not give them what you give men for the same work? 
Why not make of the teachers a satisfied, dignified, well- 
paid, thoroughly appreciated body of public officials ? Their 
work is the most important work that is done in the world. 

" Why insist on treating them as thougli they were 
' hands ' in a factory to be kept down to the lowest pos- 
sible wages ? Why not consent to pay an intelligent woman 
in the public schools, a woman to whom fifty young human 
souls are confided, as generously as you treat the man who 



I0O EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

sweeps out the halls In the Court House or the janitor 
who feeds the furnace, or even the policeman who handles 
the criminal ? " 

Other press comment was: 

*' A little while ago the Delineator was asking the ques- 
tion, 'What is the matter with the public schools?' There 
were a number of suggestions that developed from that 
investigation. There are a number of things the matter. 
Out of them all one defect in our educational system stands 
out glaringly. It is most tersely told in the last report of 
the United States Commission of Education. It's a simple 
statement of the salaries that American cities pay their 
school teachers. 

" And that, ladies and gentlemen of the school boards, is 
what is the matter with our public schools, says the Delin- 
eator. We pay our unskilled street laborers something 
like a dollar or a dollar and a quarter a day. We are pay- 
ing our school teachers some less and some a little more. 
It is the wages that a dull brain and a primitive mind are 
worth. 

" In return for such wages we are requiring a service 
that should be entrusted only to a mind and heart enriched 
with all that literature and art and science can contribute 
to a perfect culture. It should be only such a personality 
into whose training we give the future citizens of the na- 
tion. Can we get personalities like that to serve us in our 
public schools? Not any longer than they can help it. 
Just as soon as their force of character and intelligence and 
initiative enable them to reach a better-paying position, one 
that will allow them to buy books and hear music and have 
the other good things of life that tKeir large natures crave, 
they go after it. 

" Until we realize with a conviction that reaches our 
pocketbooks that the school laborer is worthy of her hire, 
we aren't going to keep the best school laborers in the 
public employ. And there will continue to be something 
the matter with the public schools." 

New York Tribune, December 31, 1907: "In making it 
somewhat easier for women teachers to secure places in the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK loi 

New York City schools Superintendent Maxwell takes cog- 
nizance of actual conditions. The present shortage of more 
than seven hundred teachers indicates the practical impos- 
sibility of maintaining ideal standards of scholarship, and 
the Superintendent considers it far wiser to furnish seven 
hundred schoolrooms with teachers of moderate attain- 
ments than to deprive some thirty thousand pupils of proper 
facilities." 

Herald, January 23, 1909 : " The Pay of Teachers." 
" ' There has never appeared any reason why teachers' sal- 
aries should be so small when compared with the impor- 
tance of the work they are called to do, but it has been 
so since the old Greek peripatetics used to dispense philos- 
ophy in exchange for a crust. — 'Washington Post.' But 
how inevitably the laws of compensation works. Poor pay 
means mediocre teachers as a rule ; mediocrity in teaching 
means inferior education, and in the train of the latter 
follows inefficiency and poverty among the masses. For- 
tunately American States and cities are learning the lesson 
that great economic waste results from poor pay for 
teachers." 

Hon. Lewis Nixon, speaking at our Carnegie Mass Meet- 
ing, supported the contention of the women as a business 
proposition. He did not consider that the law of supply 
and demand was applicable, and declared that equal pay 
ought to be granted for business reasons. It had been his 
experience that whenever a product is sold for less than 
it is worth there is deterioration in the product. It was 
conceded that the women were not being paid what they 
were worth, for the city was paying men more for iden- 
tically the same service. He added that if the inequalities 
were not rectified the result would be in the long run the 
impairment of the efficiency of the teachers. 

Associate Superintendent Davis said in Superintendent 
Maxwell's 6th Annual Report : " It seems to be impossible 
to find an adequate number of properly qualified persons to 
fill all vacancies." 

City Superintendent Maxwell in his loth Annual Re- 
port says : " I feel constrained to say from my intimate 



I02 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

acquaintance with the work of the Board of Examiners 
that the salaries now paid to women teachers are not suf- 
ficient to attract to our schools the best women teachers in 
the country." Mr. Maxwell had previously made some sal- 
lary recommendations on which the Standard-Union of 
January lo, 1908, thus commented : " The advocacy of 
equal pay for men and women teachers is taken out of 
the field of sentiment by some common-sense observations 
of Superintendent Maxwell, who recommended increasing 
the minimum for women from $600 to $720, that the max- 
imum be not less than $1500, and that all the principals 
shall receive the same salaries. He suggests there are some 
special purposes for which a few men teachers are essen- 
tial. If so, and it really costs more to get them than it 
would to get women for the same places, an exception to 
the principle of equal pay might be made here — but it is 
to be noticed that the shortage of teachers over which such 
an ado is made just now is a shortage of women teachers. 
There is much reason to suspect the notion that a qualified 
man for a man's place is harder to get than a qualified 
woman for a woman's place is more or less a myth." 

District Superintendent Richman reported : " An almost 
insurmountable obstacle to real progress is due to the fact 
that not a few teachers lack definite knowledge of the 
subject matter to be taught." 

On account of the dearth of women teachers it was an- 
nounced, " In the oral examination for license No. i, a 
standing of 62 credits will be accepted in the case of women 
who have received a sufficiently high rating in the written 
to bring the average up to 70." 

If we grant that our high schools and training schools 
are graduating only such as are fit scholastically at least, 
should not the " Oral Examination," including as it does 
ratings on " Personality," " Record," and " Use of Eng- 
lish," form the most important part of the examination for 
teacher's license? 

Some of the reasons for the scarcity of women teachers 
in the public school system are given in the address of 
Abby Leach, professor of Greek, Vassar College, before 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 103 

the Collegiate Alumnae, Boston, November, 1907. She 
said : " Girls are now turning away from teaching as their 
work and seeking other occupations, and this is right, for 
few are fitted to be teachers. But the real reason is that 
the life of a teacher does not attract them, and without 
question they do come into much more human relations in 
other lines of work. Philanthropy is popular, and anyone 
who allies herself with any philanthropic or charitable work 
is better paid, and brought into pleasanter social relations 
than a teacher. Yet there is often no comparison between 
the value of the work in each case. The teacher is train- 
ing the mind and character, the other is frequently minis- 
tering only to bodily needs ; the one works for the imma- 
terial, the other for the material. Why is the one valued 
so highly and the other undervalued? Does it mean that 
the age is so given over to material things that it does not 
really care for anything else? If parents did care deeply 
for the mental development of their children, were in ear- 
nest for them to have the best possible education, would 
they allow the profession of teaching to be so poorly paid 
as it is now? Would they submit to such poor teaching 
as is found too commonly now?" 

That the scarcity still persists is proven by the fact that 
all of the women teachers on the eligible list for license No. 
I were appointed February 24, 1910. At that date there 
were still over 100 men waiting for appointment. 

SCARCITY OF TEACHERS BREEDS OVERCROWDED CLASSES 

But the most serious result of the scarcity of teachers is 
the overcrowding of classes and the resultant crop of aver- 
age pupils. Associate Superintendent Davis reported No- 
vember, 1906: " The scarcity of teachers prevailing at the 
time of the present writing warns us that we cannot in- 
crease the number of classes and thus reduce the number of 
pupils to a class faster than is warranted by .the supply of 
trained teachers. With few exceptions, at various times 
during the year the several eligible lists for teachers tn 
the elementary schools have become exhausted." 



104 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The Globe made this pertinent comment: 

" Large classes, one of the worst evils of any public 
school system, bid fair to remain in the New York schools 
for many months. Being unable to get enough regular 
teachers for the local schools, the Board of Education has 
instructed the board of superintendents not to further de- 
crease the number of pupils to a teacher. This means that 
even the largest classes cannot be reduced in size, and that 
no more special classes for over-age and foreign-born chil- 
dren can be organized for the present. 

" There are thousands of classes in the public schools 
which have from forty-five to sixty pupils all in the care 
of one teacher. It is evident that with so many pupils the 
teacher cannot do his or her work justice. Furthermore, 
the classrooms have been planned to accommodate not more 
than fifty pupils, and to crowd more than that number into 
a single room means a decrease in the air space per child 
and less healthful conditions. . . . Under such circum- 
stances the pupils cannot do their best work." 

Mr. Joseph M. Rogers, in the March number of Lippin- 
eott's, says in an article on " Educating Our Boys " : '' No 
teacher is physically or mentally competent to give proper 
instruction to forty children, which is the average size of 
a division in the public schools. It is amazing that so 
much is accomplished under such diffiulties. It is because 
the average teacher — usually a woman — gives of her vital- 
ity and sympathy and mental force to an extent which is 
abnormal and deplorable." 

These conditions are not exaggerated. I know of two 
school districts in this city which had recently 187 classes 
with registers greater than 50, and 18 classes with registers 
of 50. This out of a total of about 650 classes. 

Yet in a report to the Board of Estimate, President Win- 
throp of the Board of Education quotes Dr. Maxwell in 
the following manner : " Fifty pupils is too large a num- 
ber to occupy any room or for any teacher to teach, no 
matter how numerous the sittings." 

And Dr. Maxwell, in an article in the City Record, said : 
" I have made a study of this subject for years and have 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 105 

reached the very definite conclusion that the Hmit of a 
teacher's most successful work is reached with the follow- 
ing number of pupils in the respective grades: 

" Kindergarten 30 

I A — 4 B 40 

5A— 8B 30 

Defectives 10." 

Yet the average number of pupils to a class in the grades 
from I A to 8 B, inclusive, according to Mr. Maxwell's 
loth Annual Report, is 42. Is it surprising that the same 
report states that there are tens of thousands of over-age 
or retarded children in our schools? 

Is this economy? Scarcity of teachers breeds large 
classes. Large classes breed over-age children. Over-age 
children cost the city to educate from two to four times 
what normal-age children cost. 

At a meeting of the Flatbush Taxpayers' Association 
January 6, 1910, Commissioner Frank Meyer of the Board 
of Education said : " It is an outrage to place 60 children 
in a room and ask a teacher to instruct them. It is a shame 
to burden teachers in the grammar grades with more than 
45 pupils at the most. . . ." 

I am sure we all agree with him. 

Wisdom says : " Hire more teachers." 

Market replies : " Can't supply them at present rates." 

Wisdom answers : '' Offer higher rates." 



CHAPTER IX 

SCARCITY OF TEACHERS BUT UNAPPOINTED MEN 

The press of yesterday, December i6, 1909, informs us 
that " having made unsatisfactory progress in their fight 
to induce the Board of Education to appoint more men 
teachers in the Elementary Schools, the men who are on the 
eligible list waiting for appointment have decided to take 
the matter to the courts. They hope to secure a decision 
which will declare illegal the practice of the Board of Edu- 
cation of making two eligible lists — one for men and the 
other for women teachers." 

Thus are the men teachers unwittingly, I think, and un- 
willingly, I believe, assisting us. We, too, want one eligible 
list as the result of one examination, but we also want one 
salary for the position to which the license thus gained en- 
titles its holder." 

Again the press states: "The Association of Unap- 
pointed Men Teachers will hold a meeting December 17, 
1909, at which committees will be appointed to continue 
the work with members of the Board of Education in order 
to convince them that men ought to be appointed." 

In Superintendent Maxwell's report for 1906-7, Asso- 
ciate Superintendent Davis, then Chairman of the Super- 
intendent's Committee on Nomination, Transfer and Ap- 
pointment, discussing the supply of teachers, says : " The 
scarcity of regular class teachers has continued during the 
past year. Each eligible list has been exhausted as soon as 
received, in order that every available teacher might be 
placed in the schools at once. The cause of this scarcity 
as related to the sources of supply and to the conditions 
giving rise to an increased demand, was explained in the 
annual report of the City Superintendent. The number of 
declinations of appointment has added to our difficulties in 

106 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 107 

this matter, there having been 72 decHnations by men and 
117 by women during the year." 

In the same report, Superintendent Davis said : " The 
number of men teachers as compared with the number of 
women teachers employed in the pubHc schools will always 
remain small because of the natural restrictions upon their 
employment. Men should not be assigned to schools that 
are exclusively for girls, nor should they be assigned to 
teach little children in classes of the first three years, even 
when these classes are composed entirely of boys. As these 
restrictions shut man from the vastly greater part of the 
school system it should be plain that the opportunities for 
their appointment must be comparatively few." 

" In making nominations the Board of Supenntendents 
has considered only the conditions in the individual schools ; 
and when these have required the services of men, nomina- 
tions have been made accordingly." 

" Every request made by principals for men teachers 
has been complied with, and whenever in the judgment of 
the committee the services of a man teacher seemed de- 
sirable in any school a nomination v^as made without such 
request." 

On December 11, 1907, in order to find out the reasons 
for the shortage of teachers, the Board of Education passed 
the following resolution, offered by Mr. Cosgrove: 
" Whereas, The city superintendent has heretofore reported 
to this board that a number of classes have been deprived 
of teachers, both regular and substitute, for some time; 
therefore be it 

" Resolved, That the committee on elementary schools 
be requested to inquire into the causes leading to this re- 
sult, and report the result of such inquiry to this board, 
together with such recommendations as it may deem ad- 
visable to remedy the situation." 

On January 25, 1908, the Globe stated: "Usually the 
list from the January examinations is not announced until 
April, this year conditions regarding vacancies are such as 
to demand a speedy remedy. Heretofore it has been the cus- 
tom of the board to appoint the teachers from the January 



io8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

eligible list for service in the fall, but this year the list will 
be immediately exhausted." 

Associate Superintendent Edson in Superintendent Max- 
well's Tenth Annual Report writes : '' The usual scarcity 
of teachers prevailed until near the close of the school 
year, when a special examination was held in the month of 
April, 1908, to accommodate teachers from outside the 
city." 

" On the other hand," says Superintendent Edson in Mr. 
Maxwell's Tenth Annual Report, " the employment of men 
involves greatly increased expense. As a business propo- 
sition, therefore, it does not seem wise or necessary to have 
a large number of men in any teaching corps. As far as 
any necessity exists, a few will do as well as more." 

All in all, one is forced to the conclusion that Superin- 
tendent Edson is not worried bv the " lack of men 
teachers." 

It is often stated that " Equal Pay " will drive men out 
of the schools. It is evident that " Unequal Pay " is keep- 
ing them out. The daily press for over a year has contained 
letters from these men teachers, complaining that they are 
not appointed, and the men on the eligible list have now 
organized into what is called " The Association of Unap- 
pointed Men Teachers." They have compiled facts show- 
ing that since June, 1908, 1500 women and only 39 men 
have been appointed. This Association has recently pre- 
sented a petition to the Board of Education, praying for 
appointment. 

Following are some samples of their plaints : 

Letters to Globe: 

October 13, 1909: "Since February, 1908, 196 have 
passed the examination. Only 15 appointed." " To see over 
1000 women and young girls (many of whom had barely 
succeeded in getting the necessary rating of 70%, and had 
not yet demonstrated their capability) appointed before 
them. To bitterly realize that most of these girls ap- 
pointed had passed the examinations later than they." 

May 17, 1909: "Three men out of a total of over 100 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 109 

were appointed last month. And as it happened, one of the 
three was s^ reinstated teacher at that. The merging of the 
present and the coming eligible list will mean that some of 
us, already despairingly distant from the top will be pushed 
still farther down into the realm of almost utter hopless- 
ness." " By education and training they (the male 
teachers) are fitted for no other work." " Yet an examina- 
tion for License No. One for both men and women will 
take place in the early part of June. Such a state of affairs 
strikes me as paradoxical. Why create a large supply when 
there is no demand?" 

Matthew J. writes : " The men on the No. One list this 
year seem to be singularly fortunate ( ?). They were noti- 
fied of their having passed way back in July. . . . The 
schools open and no men are appointed. They wait two 
months, and have the pleasure of witnessing the enlivening 
spectacle of 250 women appointed and no men. They wait 
another month and see the entire list of women appointed 
and still no men, etc." 

Causal Pugntndo Habemus, June 29, 1909 : " I learned 
from your paper that the board refused to appoint men 
because of lack of funds ? Are we caused to suffer because 
we are men? If, then, men are needed, but are on the other 
hand, ' more expensive than women,' why not apportion 
appointments according to the expense? Why not appoint 
three women to every two men? etc." 

Men teachers are quite willing that women should suffer 
because they are women, but what an outrage that they 
should be caused to suft'er because they are men. Ap- 
parently C. P. H. does not realize that his plan would not 
fill so many vacancies. But what does it matter whether 
the children have teachers or not, so long- as more men 
teachers get places? 

And a citizen writes : " Apropos of the recent letters in 
the school columns of The Globe, it is not edifying to note 
how ardently men will long for harmony ' in the face of 
danger ' when they are the ones to whom danger has her 
face turned. 

" I write as a citizen who has taken a keen interest for 



no EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

moths in the brave struggle of the women teachers against 
the blatant injustice done them in the present salary 
schedule. 

" Throughout that time I have seen few statements from 
men teachers of sympathy toward the women in their fight 
for justice. On the contrary, in spite of the fact that the 
women sought inl no way to injure the men, the attitude of 
the latter has openly been and intentionally hostile to the 
women's cause. 

" Now that they * are facing danger ' these gallant gen- 
tlemen are growing tired of ' the sad story of contention ' 
that is injuring the dignity of the profession. It would 
have seemed more in keeping with their dignity and that 
of their profession had they come to this conclusion when 
they had favors to confer instead of favors to gain. 

" Manhattan, Dec. i8. Frank Maynard." 

That the Board continued to be concerned over the 
shortage of teachers appears in a report submitted to the 
Board of Education, November lo, 1909: 

" The committee on elementary schools respectfully re- 
ports that it has given careful consideration to the motion 
offered by Mr. Cosgrove at the meeting of the Board of 
Education on October 13th (1909), to the effect that this 
committee be requested to report to the Board the number 
of vacancies which exist in the elementary schools at the 
present time, how many of these vacancies can properly 
be filled by men, and also as to the advisability of appoint- 
ing men thereto. The number of vacancies existing at the 
time was about 300, most of which were filled by the ap- 
pointment at the last meeting of the Board of 250 women 
and 24 men, to take effect November first, not counting 
thirty-five teachers of special subjects. It has been the 
policy of the board of superintendents to assign men 
teachers only to boys or mixed classes, with which policy 
your committee has been and is in accord." 



CHAPTER X 

FALSE CRY OF SCARCITY OF HIGH SCHOOL MEN 

In view of the facts presented herewith, it is difficult not 
to beHeve that there has been dehberate and wilful misrep- 
resentation by those who have been clamoring for increased 
salaries for high school men teachers on the ground that 
there is a scarcity of such teachers. 

The figures in the following table are taken from Su- 
perintendent Maxwell's Annual Report for year ending 
July 31, 1908. (See table next page.) 

It is plain, therefore, that while only 44 per cent, of the 
pupils in the high schools are boys, that 47 per cent, of the 
teachers in the same schools are men. What authorities 
demand more men? Many of us think that if the percent- 
age of high school men teachers equals the percentage of 
boy pupils, any reasonable demand should be satisfied. 

The preponderance of men cannot be justified on the 
ground that men are better prepared because according to 
eminent authority men have less education as a preparation 
for teaching in the secondary public schools of the United 
States than women, and they remain in teaching very little 
longer than the opposite sex. Professor Edward L. Thorn- 
dike of the Teachers' College, Columbia University, 
reached these conclusions as the result of a careful investi- 
gation into the subject, and presented them in a publica- 
tion entitled " The Teaching Stafif of Secondary Schools 
in the United States," made at the request of the United 
States Bureau of Education, Professor Thorndike presents 
a variety of significant facts with reference to education, 
experience and salaries of teachers in our secondary 
schools. The report develops the fact that over five-ninths 
of the women have as long an education as has the median 
man, and not quite two-fifths of the women have taught as 
long as the median man. 



112 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Further evidence of the spuriousness of this cry of 
" Scarcity of High School Men " is given by Examiner 



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Walter L. Hervey, who was in charge of the high school 
teachers' examinations in an appendix to Dr. Maxwell's 
last annual report, that the plentiful supply has " made it 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 113 

possible to apply a correspondingly rigid principle of selec- 
tion not only in respect of scholarship and teaching ability, 
but particularly in respect of use of English and person- 
ality." 

"It is a fortunate thing for the schools that such a sit- 
uation exists. It is always unfortunate when, in order 
merely to supply an urgent demand for teachers, it is neces- 
sary, as it sometimes has been necessary, to license candi- 
dates who for any reason are doubtful or ' on the line,' 
or who have an insufficient command of English ; or who, 
in dress, manner or personal habits, are careless or unre- 
fined ; or who, though satisfying these and many other re- 
quirements, lack those traits of responsibility, public spirit 
and devotion, without which a teacher may indeed give 
instruction in a subject, but cannot be an effective and 
loyal member of the faculty of a school." 

In April, 1908, the board was forced by scarcity of 
teachers to hold a special and extra examination for 
teachers for elementary schools. In striking contrast was 
the condition affecting high schools. For years it has been 
the custom to hold an examination for high school teachers 
in April and another in October. In 1908, however, there 
there were so many teachers available that the April ex- 
amination was abandoned, and the October examination 
advanced to September. Furthermore, the announcement 
for the September examination showed that it would cover 
but few subjects, as in the others the supply was sufficient. 

The Globe, January 10, 1910, said: " There is no dearth 
of applicants for positions as teachers in the local schools 
now. The November high school tests brought out nearly 
five hundred applicants." Yet Superintendent Stevens is 
quoted as saying : " We must either oft"er better induce- 
ments or lower our standard for high school men." 

Other evidence is given in press comments as : On Oc- 
tober 20, 1909, the Globe published the following : 

" At the recent hearings on the budget statements have 
been made frequently which tended to show that the supply 
of teachers for high schools was much less than the demand 
and that such condition did not exist in the elementary 



114 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

schools. Certain facts appear to have been overlooked. 
Examinations for elementary school teachers are held regu- 
larly in January and June each year, irrespective of the 
condition of the eligible list. Examinations for teachers 
in the various subjects in high schools are held only when 
the list in that particular subject is nearly exhausted. Thus 
at the present time when the high school teachers are so 
much in demand, the examination for such teachers to be 
held in November will cover only a few subjects. The 
limited demand is due in large measure to failure to hold 
examinations. 

" Under date of October 27, City Superintendent Max- 
well announces that the November examinations will also 
include tests for library assistants and for men teachers of 
stenography, mechanical drawing, English and joinery, and 
for men and women teachers of commercial branches and 
freehand drawing. 

" Need more be said ? " 

And later, 

" Hundreds of college graduates and experienced 
teachers are anxious to teach in the local high schools at the 
salaries now paid. At the examinations for licenses to teach 
in those schools last week there were present 460 applicants, 
the largest number which has taken such examinations in 
years, 

" One hundred and nine took the test for teachers of 
German, while 86 wanted to teach Latin. The figures for 
the other licenses were: Biology 47, French 17, English 
57, chemistry 35, stenography and typewriting 14, wood 
turning 2, forge work i, joinery 3, mechanical drawing 6, 
freehand drawing 17, music 8, commercial branches 18, 
clerical assistant 31, and library assistant 9. 

" These facts seem to bear out the contention of TJic 
Globe that the seeming scarcity of teachers for high schools 
is due to failure to hold examinations at regular intervals. 
It has been the custom to defer examinations for high 
school teachers until the existing lists are nearly exhausted." 

But most significant of all is the action indicated in the 
following from the Globe of February 8, iqio: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 115 

" Plans for increasing the supply of high school teachers 
without in any way lessening the qualifications or lowering 
the standards were blocked at a Board of Education meet- 
ing recently by Chairman A. Stern of the special commit- 
tee on increase of teachers' salaries. The reasons given 
were that he feared that the standards might be lowered 
and that to increase the supply of high school teachers 
•would result in doing azvay zvith the chief argument used 
to secure higher salaries for the men in the high schools. 
Dr. Maxwell's assurance that the standards would not be 
lowered and that experienced local teachers now in their 
prime would be secured, was of no avail. Mr. Stern with- 
drew his signature from the report, which, he stated, had 
been presented to him only fifteen minutes before, and as 
he made the third member whose signature made the re- 
port possible it had to be withdrawn from consideration. 

" The report from the by-law committee provided an 
amendment to the qualifications for eligibility for license 
as assistant teachers to the effect that the requirement of 
two years experience in grades of the ' last two years ' of 
the elementary school course for persons not college grad- 
uates should be changed to * last* four years ' of the elemen- 
tary school course. 

"Will not the change," said A. Stern, " result in securing 
a poorer kind of teacher?" 

" It is my deliberate judgment," replied Dr. Maxwell, 
"that the change will not result in inferior teachers. It 
must be remembered that they are to come from our own 
schools. In the upper grades are most of the older teachers 
in the system, and under this plan an opportunity will be 
given to those who have served from seven to twelve years 
in the schools, to those just in their prime, to secure posi- 
tions in the high schools. The examiners will not let down 
the bars. This board can well trust them to see to it that 
only those well qualified for the work are licensed." 

" This reply was a disappointment to Mr. Stern, who ex- 
plained that the change was more serious than he thought 
when he signed the report. * It was presented to our com- 
mittee only about fifteen minutes ago, and I signed it, but 



ii6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

on further consideration I believe we should go slow. 
Can't the members see how dangerous it zvould be just at 
this time when we are trying to secure increases in salaries 
to do anything to increase the supply? We have re- 
peatedly sought increases for the men teachers in the high 
schools, and one of the main reasons for doing so was the 
inability to get teachers, and now it is proposed to do away 
with the demand by stating that we can get teachers and 
will get them at a cheaper rate. I do not believe we will get 
the proper type of men if we alter the qualifications. At 
■any rate, let us wait a while before we act.' " 



CHAPTER XI 

THE FAMILY-TO-SUPPORT ARGUMENT 

It is rather a sad commentary on our profession that its 
men members are the only men who object to women mem- 
bers of the same profession getting the same pay for the 
same work. Who ever heard of a man lawyer fighting a 
woman lawyer in this way? A man doctor arguing that 
another doctor should give her services for less pay simply 
because she happened to be a woman? And leaving the 
professions, what attitude do we find the men who form 
our " Labor Unions " taking on this question ? They form 
a solid phalanx on the side of " Equal Pay." The most 
powerful of all unions in many respects — " Big Six " — has 
a By-Law making it a misdemeanor to pay a woman less 
than a man working at the same form. All Labor Unions 
fight " two prices on a job." 

Is it not sad to see men, American men, shoving aside, 
trampling down, and snatching the life preservers from 
their sisters? I say life preservers seriously and mean it 
literally. For to the woman obliged to support herself, is 
not her wage earning ability truly a life preserver. How 
can any man except one whom she is legally privileged to 
assist, take from a woman any part of the wages she has 
earned, and remain worthy even in his own eyes ? The ex- 
cuses he makes to himself and to others in the attempt to 
justify his act, tend to belittle him more and more. 

And yet some men whose blood sisters have by teaching 
provided the money to enable them, their brothers, to be- 
come teachers, oppose those very sisters in their efforts to 
obtain " Equal Pay for Equal Work." Can one ask for 
stronger proof of the insidious danger to our manhood 
which lurks in unjust standards of salary for service ren- 
dered? The true man, the good man, ought to put the 
woman who earns a respectable living, on a pedestal, as a 

117 



ii8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

beacon of encouragement to other women to show them 
one who wanted clothes to wear, and food to eat, and a 
place to live, and who obtained them by honorable labor. 



THE FAMILY-TO-SUPPORT ARGUMENT 

I must say at the outset that in my opinion considerations 
of family responsibilities have no place in the fixing of 
Salary Schedules. I hold that salary is for service, and 
should be measured by the service rendered, irrespective of 
the size, weight, color, complexion, race, previous condition 
of servitude, height, length of nose, location of ear, charac- 
ter of costume, religion, size of shoe, height of heel worn, 
hair or lack of hair on the face or head, number of children, 
nephews, nieces, aunts, grandfathers, parents — real or in- 
law — or other dependent relatives, of the person rendering 
the service. I'm sure if a man comes to sweep off the snow 
from your front stoop, you do not ask him if he is married 
and how many children he has, in order to fix the price for 
his work. 

But for the sake of argument and of the opportunity to 
ask a question or two, we will consider this — the most com- 
mon and persistent of the arguments proposed by our male 
opponents. A man who is a teacher should be given a 
higher salary than a woman who is a teacher, because a 
man has— or may have — a family to support. 

Notice, I say " a man who is a teacher." I do this be- 
cause I have never heard a man who is a doctor, or a law- 
yer, or a plumber, or a grocer, or a baseball player, or a 
barber, or a janitor, propose said argument. 

Now, if salary is to be measured by the size of the salary 
receiver's family, why do we give Mayor Gaynor with six 
children the same salary we gave Mayor McClellan with 
no children? Or why does our Board of Education give 
Superintendent X. with no children as much salary as it 
gives Superintendent Y. with nine children? Again, has 
not Miss M., who has to support an invalid father and an 
uncle in an insane asylum, the same right to consideration 
as Mr. N. who has a wife and a son to support? 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 119 

As a matter of fact, if these considerations have any 
place in the fixingj of salaries, Miss M. should be given the 
higher salary, because, as has been well put by Miss Ennis, 
Secretary of the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers, every child is in the nature of an endowment 
policy for his parents, as he is a potential wage-earner, 
while the relatives dependent on the woman teacher are, 
as a rule, those from whom she can look for no assistance 
in her old age. 

Another member of our Executive Committee, Miss 
Clara Calkins, disposed neatly of this argument, by sug- 
gesting to a member of the Board of Education who inter- 
posed this objection to " Equal Pay," that the Board fix a 
salary for a position and then add a bonus for each child 
or dependent. 

The " Family-to-Support," or "' Family-Wage " argu- 
ment ranks above even the " Supply-and-Demand " argu- 
ment in the age and the frequency of its use by our male 
teacher opponents. 

Is it not pitiful to find the very men who are reputed to 
be hired for their " Manly Influence " so unmanly ? How 
any self-respecting wife and mother can permit her hus- 
band to go around publicly begging because he married 
her and with her became the fortunate possessor of chil- 
dren, is beyond my comprehension. Why is she satisfied 
to be on a different plane as a wife than is the girl who 
married a doctor, or a lawyer, or a merchant, or a plum- 
ber, or a street sweeper? 

I can only account for her attitude by assuming that she 
thinks as her husband does, and I account for his attitude 
by believing one of three things : 

(i) that he did not take up the sacred profession of 
teaching because he found it to be his true vocation, but 
rather because it was an easy road to an assured income; 

(2) that he belong tO' a race whose traditions have always 
always placed woman on a lower plane than a man ; or 

(3) that he is of the conservative type, dead to all 
progress, that believes because a condition " has been," it 
should continue to be, 



I20 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I am firmly convinced that while teaching is a natural 
vocation for most women, it is rarely the trvie vocation of 
a man. And that those who enter, the profession without 
the love for it which overshadows even the pocket returns, 
invariably deteriorate. Their lives are spent largely among 
those whom they consider their subordinates — in position 
or in salary, if not in intellect — the children and the women 
teachers. They grow to have an inordinate opinion of 
themselves. No matter how ridiculous or absurd or unfair 
may be the attitudes they take and the things they say, 
there is no one to say, " Nonsense ! " as would one of his 
peers in the outer world. The novelist David Graham 
Phillips in the following description of one of his characters 
expresses my opinion better than I can myself : " Peter 
was not to blame for his weakness. He had not had the 
chance to become otherwise. He had been deprived of that 
hand-to-hand strife with life which alone makes a man 
strong. Usually, however, the dangerous truth as to his 
weakness was well hidden by the fictitious seeming of 
strength which obstinacy, selfishness and the adulation of 
a swarm of sycophants and dependents combine to give a 
man of means and position." 

Recently in one of our schools, a male assistant to the 
principal resigned. The vacancy thus caused was filled 
by a woman. This woman is doing the same work as the 
man did, but with greater satisfaction to the principal. 
But she is being paid $800 a year less than the man was. 

In another school I know there was a woman assistant 
to principal. As a grade teacher she had married and re- 
signed, expecting — ^as most girls do when they marry — 
that she wouldn't have to work outside the home any more. 
But her husband became a victim of tuberculosis, and they 
went to Colorado in search of health for him. Time passed, 
their funds were exhausted, the invalid was unable to work, 
and so they came back, and the wife — after certifying, as 
our by-laws require, that her husband was unable to sup- 
port her and had been so for two years — was reappointed. 
Later she secured promotion to assistant to principal. Dur- 
ing the day she labored in a large, progressive school, com- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 121 

posed almost wholly of children born in Russia, or of Rus- 
sian parentage. At night she taught a class of foreign 
men. Now, although she actually had a family to support, 
she was receiving $800 a year less than a man in her posi- 
tion would receive. A married man? Oh, no, not neces- 
sarily. He might be a millionaire bachelor, or the pet of 
a wealthy wife — it is only necessary for him to be a 
" male " assistant to principal. Possibly on account of her 
family responsibilities, probably because she was ambitious, 
she strove for a principalship. During the school year, she 
traveled to Columbia University and took post-graduate 
courses after school and on Saturdays ; during the summer, 
when she should have been resting, she was studying with 
Professor This and Professor That. Last September she 
took the examination for a principal's license : in October, 
she died — typhoid, the doctors said. The husband she had 
cheerfully and lovingly supported for years survived her 
but a few weeks. 

Why have I dwelt on this? To show the absurdity of 
the " family wage " argument of the male teacher. 

A circular recently issued by some of our male-teacher- 
opponents evidenced this pitiable state of mind. Following 
are some quotations with comment : 

3. " To the employee that wage is just which furnishes 
the living wage — understanding thereby living in accord- 
ance with the physical, mental and moral standards of the 
class of laborers." 

One is forced to ask, Who will set the physical, mental, 
moral standards that differentiate a teacher from a 
preacher, doctor, lawyer, artist, engineer, etc.? 

4. "To the Adult man teacher that wage is just which 
furnishes such a living wage for the average family." 

Again the male teacher is segregated in a pitiful class of 
mendicants. 

6. "A mandatory wage greater than that is unjust to 
the employer. His liberalit}^ must be limited by consider- 
ations of the quality only of the zvork." 

Pity the average male teacher if this were made the ac- 
tual standard of wages. 



122 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

8. " It follows that from the standpoint of the employer 
the necessary masculine wage is an unnecessary feminine 
wage. This is, I believe, cold-blooded economic law. Sal- 
aries are not ' rewards of merit.' They are the market 
price of labor." 

In what new dissertation on logic and economics shall v/e 
find accepted definitions of " the necessary masculine wage," 
"unnecessary feminine wage"? Senator F., in opposing 
our bill, quoted, " Shall the single woman, in teaching, be 
given the married woman's wage?" I ask. Why not? — 
just as the single woman in washing, in farming, in mil- 
linery, in nursing, in telephoning, and writing. 

9. "Equalization must be on (i) basis above, (2) equal 
to, or (3) lower than the necessary masculine wage." 

Again the masculine wage. On this point the following 
letter from Mr. Arthur Gibb, proprietor of Frederick 
Loeser & Co., one of the largest department stores in the 
city, employing thousands of men and women during the 
year, is pertinent : 

" Brooklyn, March 5, 1908. 
" Miss Grace C. Strachan. 

"Dear Madam: The movement has my entire sympathy 
and I hope you will be successful in your endeavor to have 
the salaries of men and women teachers equalized. To 
claim that a man should have more pay than a woman 
because he may have more people dependent upon him is 
as absurd as to claim that a man with six children should 
have more pay than one with none. Neither the city nor 
any other employer should consider anything but zuhether 
the person is fitted to till the place, salary being based on 
the work performed and not on sex. 

" Yours very truly. 

" Arthur Gibb." 

10. " If on either of the first two theoretical possibilities, 
it is unjust to the employer, so far as the present corps of 
women teachers are concerned; it is unjust to women can- 
didates, as only the very exceptional women will be taken ; 
unjust to the schools, as women will be repfaced by men." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 123 

We appreciate the acknowledgment that the schools 
would suffer if women should be replaced by men. We 
note the continued expression of distrust of the Board of 
Education. 

The men who are opposing " Equal Pay " seem inca- 
pable of " seeing true " : witness the crooked reasoning of 
the following: 

" To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

" Several labor unions have indorsed the female teachers' 
plea for equal pay. The men teachers want to submit 
through the Eagle that these indorsements have been se- 
cured without a fair consideration of facts. Notwithstand- 
ing that the male teachers are making a distinctly labor 
union fight to maintain a high standard of salary, the unions 
have in no instance called for the men's side. Therefore, 
we must come out in the open and declare our posi- 
tion. 

" Everybody knows that the mission of w^omen in the 
labor world has been to lower wages. Hence the hope of 
every labor idealist: the elimination of women from the 
competitive field. And how? By making work too attrac- 
tive for her to ever w^ant to leave it or by fixing the man's 
salary according to the low standard that obtains every- 
where for the woman? Does any labor unionist want his 
salary measured by the standard his boss is willing to 
adopt for his girl laborers? Would labor unionism be do- 
ing its duty by the millions of men toiling to support fam- 
ilies if it were to send throughout the nation the edict that 
wherever a woman was employed, in public or private serv- 
ice, she should be paid as much as her male co-worker — and 
more pernicious still — that no man should be paid a dollar 
more than the woman employed in similar service. 
Wouldn't this be a blow at the very vitality of unionism? 
Wouldn't it everywhere regulate the man's salary by the 
universally lower woman's salary ? Ought any labor union- 
ist demand that the Legislature of New York enact this 
precedent? The essence of unionism is antagonistic to class 
legislation, Whv, then, do the unions demand laws for the 



124 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

female school teacher that they would deny their own fe- 
male co-workers? 

" The men teachers of New York are not makinof a fight 
to hold their grip on the dollar. Few of them — an insig- 
nificant minority— will lose a cent by the proposed legisla- 
tion. Our fight is not for those that are in, but for those 
who are to come in. We don't Vv'ant a $2,160 maximum cut 
to $1,635 for the young man entering the profession now. 
We don't believe that the salary of any man in any public 
activity should be regulated by the low rate that time and 
custom have universally fixed for women. 

" M. T. 

" Brooklyn, March 18, 1907." 



" ' M. T.' is evidently unfamiliar with the principles gov- 
erning trade unions, or he would have known that they 
have always strenuously objected to low-priced labor, 
whether it is of men, women or children; that they have 
for many years done their utmost to drive children out of 
the factories, mills and mines ; that they have everywhere 
lent their aid and assistance to women to organize for 
higher wages and less hours of labor. Typographical 
Union No. 6 at one time had to compete with woman 
labor for which employing printers paid less per thousand 
ems than for that of men. When the ' matter ' set up by 
the women was corrected and ready for the forms, it was 
just as valuable as was that set up by the men. As a rule 
women took longer to set a tliousand ems, and sometimes 
their proofs contained more errors; but as they had to make 
the corrections the loss was theirs. They, therefore, could 
not earn as much as men, even though they had received 
the same price per thousand. There were women, however, 
who were exceptions to that rule, and could do as much 
and as good work as the average man. Of late years, 
women have received in union offices the same rates as the 
men for piece work. — Editor Brooklyn Eagle." 

Yet, I would not be understood as despising all men 
who choose the teaching profession, or as belittling the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 125 

value of good men in our public schools. There are some 
splendid men in our system, men contact with whom is 
beneficial to associates and pupils alike. Needless to say, 
they all love justice, and are therefore all warm advocates 
of " Equal Pay " schedules. 

Nevertheless, I pray that no one of my eight nephews 
shall feel a " call " to teach while the present conditions, 
deadly to the finest moral and manly virtues, exist. 

One of the best things that has been written in connec- 
tion with our fight, is the following editorial. It was the 
leader in the New York Press of February 21, 1910: 

f " Moral Astigmatism 

" We imagine that disinterested people will read with a 
feeling of mixed censure and amusement the statement 
made by the men teachers of the elementary schools, in a 
pamphlet addressed to the Board of Education, in regard 
to the subject of equal pay for men and women teachers. 

" They, the men, have come out against equal pay. Per- 
fectly natural action, based on na'ive selfishness, is likely 
to provoke a smile, mixed with unfavorable criticism. The 
men are afraid, no doubt, that if the women receive more 
pay, they (the men) will not receive so much, or that, at 
any rate, their pay will not be so likely to be raised. 

" One of the arguments used by the men teachers against 
equal pay is that such a system would tend to prevent the 
women marrying, that it would ' involve the establishment 
of a preferred celibate class.' In other words, these men 
fear a system by which women may no longer feel them- 
selves forced to marry for economic reasons. They say, in 
effect, ' keep down the salaries of women, for if we give 
them an opportunity for independence they won't marry 
us.' 

" Any action such as this on the part of the men teach- 
ers which tends to limit the growing independence of 
women is reactionary and short-sighted. The fact that so 
many women are led to marry in order to improve their 
material condition is hateful to our ideals. It is probably 



126 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ttue, that under a system of equal pay, where services 
should be paid for irrespective of sex, some women who 
now marry would remain single. But there are some men 
to-day who remain single because of relative economic in- 
dependence, which they desire to maintain. These men 
are, however, relatively few. Women are as instinctive and 
as normal as men are, and independence, which they feared 
to lose, would prevent very few from marrying when they 
could make marriages which were attractive to them. In- 
dependence of women would improve marriage, since fewer 
women would marry because of necessity. By the same 
means divorce would be decreased, and human happiness 
would have a boom. 

" But these wide considerations do not appeal to a body 
of men teachers whom their ' interests ' have made morally 
astigmatic. Especially from teachers, perhaps, we should 
demand some element of altruism and sympathy with so- 
cial progress." 

The following was the result when I tried to outline a 
debate on the resolution : That men teachers should be 
paid a higher salary than women teachers, because they 
have families to support. 

Affirmative: 

Granted (a) That it is the fashion to look upon the man 
as the support of the family. 
Negative: 

Granted (a) That salary is for service rendered. 

(b) That 500,000 women of our country are wage- 
earners. 

(c) That the public schools are not included in the elee- 
mosynary institutions of the city, county, or State. 

(d) That a man teacher who has no one dependent on 
him is paid the same salary as one who has many depend- 
ent upon him. 

(e) That the man teacher whose wife is worth $100,000 
is paid the same salary as the man teacher who marries a 
poor school teacher who has no money or property income. 



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Hon. George B. McClellan, 

Mayor of the City of New York Who Vetoed the "White" 
AND the "Gledhill-Foley" 'Equal Pay" Bills — 1907* and 
1909. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 127 

(f) That most women teachers have many dependent on 
them. 

(g) That only a fraction of one per cent, of the women 
teachers have no one dependent on them. 

(h) That our own school records contain evidence that 
some women teachers are supporting even their husbands. 

(i) That men doctors do not demand a higher fee than 
women doctors. 

(j) That men typesetters do not get higher pay than 
women typesetters. 

(k) That men attendance officers in our public school 
system do not get more pay than women attendance officers. 
(I have one woman officer who supports herself and three 
children and contributes to the support of her father. I 
have one man officer, who is a young bachelor and con- 
tributes to the support of a widov/ed mother.) 

(1) That men who teach in our evening schools are not 
paid more than women who teach in the same schools. 

(m) That men who teach in our summer schools are not 
paid more than women who teach in the same schools. 

(n) That the United States does not pay the man teacher 
more than it pays the woman teacher. 

(o) That no State in the Union except New York fixes 
by statute a salary for a man higher than that for a woman 
occupying the same position. 

(p) That New York State nowhere fixes a salary for a 
man higher than that for a woman except in Section 1091 
of the Charter of the City of New York, which sets the 
minimum salaries for " female " teachers and for " male " 
teachers. 



CHAPTER XII 

CIVIL SERVICE AND SALARY SCHEDULES 

All we ask is to be paid on the same basis as other 
Civil Service employees. That sex of worker is not con- 
sidered either by the city or the State in other departments 
is amply proven by the following: 

" New York, January 31, 1908. 
''My dear Miss Strachan: 

" Replying to your letter of the 26th instant, I have to 
say that among Civil Service employees sex is not made a 
basis for difference in salary when the position held is 
the same. 

" I am sending you, under separate cover, a copy of the 
Rules and Classifications of the Municipal Civil Service 
Commission. 

" Yours sincerely, 

" Arthur J. O'Keefe, 
"J. G. C. (Civil Service Commissioner)." 

The quotations below are interesting in this connection: 

" On Wednesday, Nov. 4, the Civil Service Commission 
will conduct an examination for typewriting copyist, sec- 
ond grade, for the Board of Water Supply. The examina- 
tion is open to both men and women. The requirements 
are identical. The salary is the same for both sexes. 

" This is a recognition of the principle of ' equal pay 
for equal work.' This is the principle which the women 
teachers ask be applied in the public schools. 

" The city recognizes it in one branch of the city gov- 
ernment, why not in the schools ? " 

Another : 

" * Equal pay for equal work ' is not a new principle in 

128 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 129 

New York City government. Ample evidence of this fact 
is presented in the recent announcements of future Civil 
Service examinations. 

" On Jan. 22 an examination will be held for the posi- 
tion of dietitian, and it is open to both men and women 
on equal terms, and the salary ranges from $720 to $1,500 
per annum, there being no discrimination on account of sex. 

" On Jan. 25 an examination will be held for bacteriol- 
ogist. It is open to both men and women, and the salary 
is $1,200. There is no sex discrimination here. 

" Why should there be discrimination in the pay of 
teachers? " 

Another : 

" Since the agitation started by the Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers, that the position of public 
school teacher be placed under the jurisdiction of the Mu- 
nicipal Civil Service Commission, subject to all regulations 
of civil service, the interest throughout the city is centering 
around the women holding any and all governmental posi- 
tions. The transfer on Thursday of Miss Anna Murphy 
from the Department of Public Charities to the License 
Inspector's Department has occasioned considerable com- 
ment. 

" The salary paid Miss Murphy is the same as that paid 
to any of the men holding a like position. 

" There are now three women holding the position of 
Inspector of Licenses, each at a salary of $1,500 — all ap- 
pointed by Commissioner Bogart, who believes that in every 
position, be it public or private, appointments should be 
made irrespective of sex, provided the incumbent is capable 
of holding such position. . . . 

" The appointment of Miss Murphy is a further incentive 
to the women school teachers to have all positions of the 
Department of Education placed under the civil service 
jurisdiction." 

Extract from our Memorandum to the Ivins Charter 
Commission : 

" Sirs: The twelve thousand members of the Interbor- 
ough Association of Women Teachers of the City of New 



I30 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

York, representing every grade and department of the pub- 
lic school service from kindergarten to district superintend- 
ent inclusive, is unanimous in its petition that you recom- 
mend such a revision of the Chapter on Education as will 
secure: 
" A. — Salary for position, regardless of sex of incumbent. 

and in support thereof we beg you to consider: 

" I. The recent opinion of Judge Gray of the New York 
Court of Appeals in the case of State vs. Williams, in which 
he says: 

" * The right of the State to restrict or regulate the labor 
and employment of children is unquestionable ; but an adult 
female is not to be regarded as a ward of the State, or in 
any other light than the man is regarded when the question 
relates to the business pursuit or calling. 

" ' In the gradual course of legislation upon the rights of 
a woman in this State she has come to possess all the re- 
sponsibilities of the man, and she is entitled to be placed 
on an equality of rights with the man. Considerations of 
her physical differences are sentimental and find no proper 
place in the discussion of the constitutionality of the act.' 

" 2. That in Section 1091 of the Charter, the State in 
effect said to the Board of Education, it is the policy of 
the State to pay women teachers less than men teachers; 
and yet a careful study of Chapter 577, Laws of New 
York, ' An Act making Appropriations for the Support of 
Government ' — the only other Act in which the State ap- 
pears as an employer of labor — fails to disclose a single 
indication that the State as an employer considers sex of 
the incumbent in fixing the salary of the position. For 
instance, on pages 19 and 20, we find : 

*** Department of Education. 
" * Commissioner's Office. 
" * For the salaries : 

of the commissioner of education, seven thousand five 
hundred dollars ($7,500), and for his traveling and 
other expenses, one thousand five hundred ($1,500), 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 131 

pursuant to chapter forty, laws of nineteen hundred 
foufc 
secretary to the commissioner, one thousand five hundred 

dollars ($1,500) ; 
of the employees according to grade: 
sixth grade, two employees, one thousand dollars each 
($2,oog) ; 

" * Administration Division^ 
chief, three thousand dollars ($3,000) ; 
cashier, two thousand five hundred dollars ($2,500) ; 
of the employees according to grade: 

seventh grade, one employee, one thousand five hun- 
dred dollars ($1,500) ; 
sixth grade, two employees, one thousand two hun- 
dred dollars ($2,400) ; two employees, one thousand 
dollars each ($2,000) ; 
fifth grade, three employees, nine hundred dollars each 

($2,700) ; 
fourth grade, one employee, seven hundred twenty 
dollars ($720).' 

"On Page 27: 

" ' Teachers' Institutes. 
" * For the salaries : 

of five institute conductors, three thousand dollars each 
($15,000) ; _ 

of a special instructor in drawing, two thousand two 
hundred dollars ($2,200) ; 

of a special instructor in primary work, reading and liter- 
ature, two thousand dollars ($2,000) ; 

of a special instructor in English, one thousand two hun- 
dred dollars ($1,200).' 

"Page 53: 

"'State Commission in Lunacy. 
" * For the salaries : 

of the medical commissioner, seven thousand and five 

hundred dollars ($7,500) ; 
legal commissioner, five thousand dollars ($5,000) ; 



132 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

lay commissioner, five thousand dollars ($5,000) ; 
medical inspector, four thousand five hundred dollars 

($4,500) ; 
secretary, four thousand dollars ($4,000) ; 
auditor of the state hospital estimates, four thousand 

dollars ($4,000) ; 
of the employees according to grades: 

eighth grade, one employee, one thousand seven hun- 
dred dollars ($1,700) ; 
seventh grade, three employees, one thousand five hun- 
dred dollars each ($4,500) ; 
sixth grade, four employees, one thousand and two 

hundred dollars each ($4,800) ; 
fourth grade, one employee, seven hundred dollars 

($700) ; 
second grade, one employee, four hundred twenty 
dollars ($420)/ 

" Page 55, 

'^ * Rochester State Hospital. 

" ' For the maintenance of the Rochester state hospital, 
two hundred forty thousand dollars ($240,000), or so much 
thereof as may be necessary/ 

"Page 58. 

" ' Prison Department. 
" * For the salaries : 

of the superintendent of state prisons, six thousand 

dollars ($6,000) ; 
superintendent's clerk, four thousand dollars ($4,000) ; 
two stenographers, one thousand dollars each (2,000) ; 
messenger, one thousand dollars ($1,000) ; 
one parole officer, one thousand five hundred dollars 

($1,500) ; 
two parole officers, one thousand two hundred dollars 

each ($2,400)/ 
" 3. We pray you to consider also in this connection 
whether the Civil Service Laws are not being violated when 
persons who have complied with the same requirements 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 133 

as to qualifications and examinations in competing for a 
position, are not then placed in order o£ standing on the 
same eligible list, and paid the same salary when appointed 
to the same position. 

" In conclusion, we reiterate : The Interborough As- 
sociation of Women Teachers of the City of New York, 
prays that in your report you will recommend such a re- 
vision of the Chapter on Education as will remove the 
injustices to women in the salary schedules incorporated 
in Section 1091 of the Charter of the City of New York, 
without, however, removing from the teachers of this city 
the protection of having their minimum salaries fixed by 
the State." 



SALARY BASED ON SEX-SALARY. BASED ON DRESS 

Alfred Hall in a letter to the North Side Board of Trade 
(Bronx), under the date of March i, 1908, wrote: 

"Our women teachers are not asking for charity; they 
only ask for the same pay as the male teachers receive for 
doing identically the same work. — Woman disguised as 
man has done duty in army, navy and various other posi- 
tions, and always received the salary that went with the 
position, and if one of our girls in man's attire, applied 
for a position as teacher in our public schools and passed 
the necessary examinations, she would receive a man's 
pay. Woman should need no disguise to get justice in 
a civilized country. — The man, in cap and gown, sits on 
the bench to dispense justice, and his salary is not re= 
duced on account of his wearing the frock. The emblem 
of justice is a female figure holding the scales, but her sex, 
alas ! is denied justice because of that sex." 

That woman has been accepted as man because of her 
dress, and has been paid wages as a man, is proven by 
the following: 

St. Louis, February 16. — " James " Davis, who de- 
ceived as to sex even Del Brown, the man who shared 
" Jameses '* room at a boarding house were both employed 



134 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

as men servants, is really Mabel Davis, of Waverly, New 
York. 

Miss Marion Hamilton Gray, who dressed as a boy and 
posed as a boy ever since childhood, according to the story 
she told Magistrate Kernochan in Night Court last night, 
is going to don petticoats. 

The Magistrate advised her to, and she said she would. 

Until about two years ago she had found her masculine 
disguise perfectly comfortable and her masculine life, in- 
cluding cigarettes and pipe, very agreeable. She crossed 
the ocean as a cabin boy without detection. She had a 
goodly income from somewhere in Great Britain. She was 
accepted as the son of Colonel Hamilton-Gray of the 
British Army, and kinsman of the noble Scottish family of 
that ilk. 

Butte, Montana, December 12, — " The sudden death yes- 
terday, at Manhattan, of ' Sammy ' Jones, aged 80, dis- 
closed the fact that instead of being a man, as everyone in 
the vicinity of Manhattan for the past eighteen years had 
believed ' him ' to be, Jones was a woman." 

St. Louis, February 15. — "'William' Winters, a hand- 
some, rosy-cheeked boy, was transformed to Miss Lillian 
Winters to-day. ' My first job was at Quincy, III, posting 
bills, and I continued the work for two years. I wanted 
to live in a larger city and came to St. Louis in the latter 
part of 1902. I have lived here all this time as a man 
and not one person has suspected that I was otherwise. 
The best job I ever had was while I drove a wagon for a 
foundry and that only paid $12. The impulse has always 
been strong with me to break away from the men I was 
thrown in contact with, and while I behaved as one of 
them I hated it all. I wanted to be a girl.'" 

If any of the above had succeeded in getting a license 
to teach in the city of New York without having her dis- 
guise discovered, she would have received a male teacher's 
salary — " a family wage." 



CHAPTER XTII 

WOMEN TEACHERS AND OTHER WOMEN CIVIL SERVICE 
EMPLOYEES 

In this connection the difference in the requirements for 
eligibihty must be considered. 

The character of the work required, the years of prep- 
aration involved, the necessity for constant study, the vital 
importance of maintaining a good social position in the 
community should all be taken into consideration when 
the matter of fixing a fair remuneration for a teacher is 
at issue. 

Under the Compulsory Education Law, a girl may leave 
school when she has reached the age of fourteen years, 
and has satisfied certain scholastic requirements in ele- 
mentary subjects — fixed by the Board of Superintendents 
as those of the 5B grade ; while in order to be eligible to 
teach in our elementary schools, a girl must have graduated 
from a four years' course at a high school and a two years' 
course at a Training School for Teachers, and must also 
have passed the examinationn given by the Board of Ex- 
aminers of the Department of Education, of New York 
City. 

It will thus be seen that a girl who desires to serve the 
city as a teacher in our public schools must first serve an 
apprenticeship of at least nine years : because in addition 
to fulfilling the requirements which would entitle her to 
" working papers " she must complete successfully the work 
of the sixth, seventh, and eighth years of the Elementary 
School Course, of the four years in the High School 
Course, and of the two years in the Course of the Train- 
ing School for Teachers, before she is eligible even to take 
the examination for License No. i, which she must pass 
before she is eligible for appointment as a Teacher in our 
Elementary Schools. 

135 



136 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



under Board of 
about 



On the other hand, the girl who decides to serve the 
city as a Stenographer, a Typewriter, a Telephone Opera- 
tor, a Tenement House Inspector or an Attendance Of- 
ficer, must fulfill no requiremennts as to scholarship, and 
must pass no examination other than that given by the 
Civil Service Commission for the particular position 
desired. 

STATISTICS TAKEN FROM CITY RECORD, 1905-6. 

All positions under Civil 
Service Commission. 

Number of women about 
5000. 

No salary discrimination 
against women — position carries 
salary, without regard to sex of 
person holding it. 

Mayor's Office 

Carolyn, private sec, /o6.$i8oo 

Carrie, clerk, /02 1200 

Henry, clerk 1200 

Rose, sten. bk. and typ... 1200 

Com. of License 

Rena, sec, 6/9/04 $ 900 

Marion, inspec, 9/27/05.. 1500 

City Clerk's Office 

Lillian, sten. & typr., /o4.$loso 

Francis, messenger 1200 

Anna, sten. to pres., /02. . 1200 

Dept. of Finance 

Agnes, clerk, /oi 900 

Sophie, clerk, /04 900 

Mary, sten. and typr., /oo. 1350 

Mary, sten. and typr., /gg. 1050 

Anna, sten. and typr., /93 900 

Lizzie, cleaner, /gd> 540 

John, watchman, /oi 900 

Eliz., /02 1200 

Mary, sten. and typr., /02 900 



Positions 
Education. 

Number of women 
15,000. 

Great salary discrimination 
against women, in most of the 
positions. 

Teachers of grades from 
kindergarten to 6B must teach 
16 years and have the $60 bonus 
for boys, before receiving $1300. 
This is the maximum. 



Schedule III 



Years 
I . ., 



$ 600.00 

2 640.00 

3 680.00 

4 720.00 

5 760.00 

6 800.00 

7 840.00 

S 880.00 

9 920.00 

10 960.00 

11 1000.00 

12 1040.00 

13 1080.00 

14 1120.00 

15 1160.00 

16 1200.00 

17 1240.00 

Annual increase $40. 

Bonus for boys' classes $60. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 137 

Gladys, sten. and typr., /03 900 A woman teacher must have 

Lillie, sten. and typr., /gg 1050 taught three years and passed 

And nine others. . 720 and 1200 examination for license for 

promotion and be assigned to 

Telephone operators ap- class of the 7A, 7B, or 8A 

pointed Dec, 1905 $1300 grade, before she is placed in 

Other telephone operators the schedule which pays $1320 

from $600 to $1500 at the end of 15 years, with $60 

bonus for boys' classes. 

$ 750 A woman teacher must have 

900 taught at least eleven years, 

Clerks 1050 must have secured two higher 

1200 licenses, and be assigned to a 

1500 graduating class of boys, before 

Annual increase not less than she receives $1500. 
$150. 

Medical examiners who 
have other practice be- 
sides school inspection. .$1200 

Secretaries to heads of de- 
partments, $1300, $1500. $1800. 

Stenographers and tj^pewrit- 
ers, $750, $900, $1050, $1200, 
$1350, $1500, $1600. 

Tenement house inspectors, 
$900, $1050, $1200, $1350, $1500, 
$1800. 

(Unclassified) 
Cleaner, $450, $640, $750. 

Seamstress, Truant School, 
$780. 

Attendance Officers, men and 
women, Department of Educa- 
tion, $900, $1050, $1200, $1350, 
$1500. 

When one considers the difference in the nature of the 
work and the requirements for ehgibihty between teachers, 
and the artisans mentioned below, the following facts are 
interesting: 



138 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Laborers receive from $2.00 to $3.50 per day 

Cartmen 3.50 to 4.00 per day 

Truckmen 4.50 to 5.00 per day 

Drivers 4.00 

Painters 4.00 

Blacksmiths 4.00 

Carpenters 4.00 

Stablemen 3.00 

Plasterers 5.50 

Tinsmiths 4.00 

Stokers 3.00 

Hod carriers 3.40 



Figures below taken from Superintendent Maxwell's 
Tenth Annual Report: 

717,250 Net Enrollment of Pupils in all Schools — year 
1907-8. 

$18,596,874.70 for salaries of teachers. 

Total sum per year for teachers' salaries per pupil, 
$25.92. 

Total sum per school day for teachers' salaries per pupil, 
13 cents if reckoned on 197 days ; 7 cents on 365 days. 

Total sum per school hour for teachers' salaries per 
pupil, 2 cents if reckoned on 197 days ; i cent on 365 days. 

Prevailing rate of wages per hour for carpenter is 80 
cents. 

Prevailing rate of wages per hour for plumber is 80 
cents. 

There were 197 school days in school year of 1907-8. 

A teacher's " hours " are reckoned here as six. 

N. B. — Of course, it is well known that a teacher has 
to eat and dress throughout the whole 365 days, and that 
her hours of labor do not end at three. 



OTHER COMPARISONS 

Statistics of the largest ten cities in the U. S. show the 
average maximum salary paid elementary school teachers 
to be $1373. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 139 

Street and Sewer 
Teachers Salary in First Year Laborers 



J-HJOLKJll 

Cincinnatti. . . 


•'POD'' — ^ 
. 400 = 


pi.yj.\ui. jj 
7.69 


V^l vvv_v_. 


9.87 


New Orleans. 


. 315 = 


6.06 


(C 


9.62 


Providence ... 


. 400 = 


7.69 


(( 


9.20 


Los Angeles.. 


. 540 = 


10.40 


({ 


12.00 


New York. . . 


. 600 = 


11-53 


it 





CITY PAYS BETTER SALARIES TO OTHER WOMEN WORKERS 

New York City cannot get enough teachers for its public 
schools, and one reason is that it offers better inducements 
to women to seek other city positionns. It grants " equal 
pay " to the typewriting copyists, and the salaries are as 
good, often better, than those paid to teachers, although 
the requirements for eligibility are not so high and the 
examinations prescribed are not so difficult as those pre- 
scribed for teachers. 

The Civil Service Commission has just issued the fol- 
lowing call for an examination for '' typewriting copyists": 

" Public notice is hereby given that applicationns will 
be received from Monday, Dec. 16, until 4 p. m., Monday, 
Dec. 30, 1907, for the position of typewriting copyists, 
second grade (male or female). The examination will be 
held on Monday, Jan. 20, 1908, at 10 a. m. The subjects 
and weights are : Speed test, 6 ; tabulation, 3 ; arithmetic, 
I. The salary is $600 to $1,050 per annum, inclusive. 
Candidates may also qualify as graphaphone operators. 
The minimum age is eighteen years. For further infor- 
mation apply to the secretary." 

From this it will be seen that the city recognizes the 
principle of " equal pay " or salary for position so far as 
typewriting copyists are concerned. Comparison with the 
vequirements, etc., for teachers' licenses shows that it is 
much easier to secure the $600 salary of a stenograher 
than it is to get the $600 paid to woman teachers. 

First as to requirements. The minimum age limit is 



I40 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

eighteen for teachers and for typewriting copyists. The 
preliminary education required, however, is not the same. 

A candidate for a teachers' Hcense must at least have 
completed a high school course and two years in the train- 
ing school, or else have been graduated from the Normal 
College. 

The candidate for the position of typewriting copyist is 
required to have only an elementary school education and 
need not necessarily have had experience or training in 
stenography. 

The examinations which the candidates for teachers' 
licenses must pass are much more difficult than those re- 
quired of the typewriting copyists. 

Applications for teachers' licenses must pass written ex- 
aminations and practical tests in the following subjects: 

History and principles of education. 

Methods of teaching. 

Constructive work and drawing. 

Music. 

Physical training. 

Sewing. 

In addition they must pass an oral examination. 

The subjects and weights in the examination for type- 
writing copyists are : 

Speed test, 6. 

Tabulation, 3. 

Arithmetic, i. 

As regards the salary, both begin at $600, but the 
women teachers are granted an automatic annual increase 
of $40; however typewriting copyists do not receive an 
automatic increase, their increase being determined by the 
department heads, but the amount is usually $150 each time. 
It is evident, therefore, that the typewriting copyist will 
reach the maximum at an earlier date than the teacher. 

Under such conditions it is not surprising that there 
should be a scarcity of teachers. — Globe, Dec. 20, 1907. 

A''. B. — 'Some of the work done by typewriting copyists 
is " piece work." I know a girl who could make as high 
as $200 a month. She often made $150. — G. C. S. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 141 

Miss Isabel Ennis, secretary of the Interborough As- 
sociation of Women Teachers contributed the following 
interesting comparisons : 

Telephone operators are paid $5 a week for six weeks 
while learning the handling of a switch-board ; $6 a week 
when put at work, and, if proficient, receive increases of 
a dollar a week every three months till they become senior 
operators at $10 a week. An attentive girl can become 
a supervisor within two years at $12 a week. Assistant 
chief operators get $15 a week; chief operators, $25 a 
week. 

Girls have to serve an apprenticeship of nine years with- 
out pay to earn $11.47 ^ week as teachers. 

This states the case of the public school teacher as com- 
pared with the telephone operator in the matter of salaries, 
and accounts in some degree for the shortage of 704 teach- 
ers in the public schools of this city, and for the fact that 
in October, 1907 there were 1498 classes without teachers 
at different times. 

But besides these facts, there is the further circum- 
stance that telephone operators trained by the company and 
paid during their schooling are in demand for private 
switchboards at wages varying from $10 to $15 and even 
$20 a week. 

These facts bear upon the disclosures made by TJie 
Evening Mail, on Saturday, when it was shown that there 
was a serious famine in school teachers and that one of the 
causes for this shortage of supply was that as stenograph- 
ers, after one year's training, girls could earn $780 a year, 
while it took nine years' schooling to fit a young woman 
for a $600 a year position in the public schools. 

The exposure of the way the supply of school teachers is 
diminished by the rewards offered by other lines of busi- 
ness has aroused the liveliest interest among the friends 
of the public schools and among the teachers themselves. 

One of the teachers, who has been long enough in the 
service to be well on toward the $1000 mark, through $40 
a year additions to her stipend, said : 



142 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" The dollars in the great big $600 per year paid by the 
city have lost their cartwheel size to teachers from out of 
town, for they know by experience they cannot meet their 
expenses with any such salary. Again, advancement is 
slow, and the munificent $1240 after seventeen years' ex- 
perience no longer attracts as it did, when $1240 had a 
$1600 purchasing value. 

" Apropos of your comparisons of stenographers and 
teachers, let me give you the story of two graduates of 
mine, Miss A. and Miss B., both fourteen years old. Miss 

A. had secured a position in the telephone service. Miss 

B. was to be a teacher because they ' got such nice wages.' 
I calculated on the blackboard for them that Miss A. at $6 
per week for seven years of fifty-two weeks each, would 
earn $2184. Miss B. spends four years at high school, 
two years at training school, possibly a year to ' get 
located,' and as yet has not earned a dollar. Miss B. will 
teach several years before she can be ' even ' with Miss A. 

" Compare the stock in trade of the telephone operator, 
who is paid while she is learning, and that necessary for 
the teacher, and then let any one in the system dodge the 
question as to whether or not the famine in teachers is 
connected with the fact that ' teachers get such nice wages.' 

" Nor is this all. Last spring I collected some statistics, 
among which was the salary paid to twenty telephone 
operators, all former pupils of mine. The youngest was 
sixteen, the oldest twenty. I found: 

Four received, per week $ 8 

Four received, per week 10 

Six received, per week 12 

Four received, per week 14 

Two received, per week 20 

"The average was $12 per week, 50 cents per week 
more than is paid a teacher. I found the averarge wages 
among those who became stenographers much higher." 



CHAPTER XIV 

COST 

In considering the " Cost " of " Equal Pay," we are 
dealing with the greatest obstacle that has stood in our 
way. Simmered down, the facts are: 

(a) Some male teachers have opposed us because it 
would cost so much to give the women just salaries that 
there would be less chance of the men getting a further 
raise in their salaries. 

(b) Some male taxpayers have opposed us because 
they believed it would raise their taxes. 

(c) The Board of Education has opposed us we do 
not know why. 

(d) The Mayor opposed us (i) because his Board 
of Education opposed us; (2) because he would not 
listen to our side; (3) because the money was wanted 
for something else. 

It has been noted with gratification by women teachers 
that not one woman taxpayer has ever opposed them on 
the ground of increased taxes. It has likewise been noted 
with amusement tinged with scorn that the male taxpayers 
who have opposed us as such, have evidently assumed: 
(i) that all taxpayers^ are men; (2) that the women 

1 The public press of January 10 and 11, 1910, in articles com- 
menting on the report of the Board of Taxes and Assessments 
for the year, show that a woman heads the personal tax list, and 
one tax list printed, showed 135 men assessed on $30,495,000 and 
146 women assessed on $31,365,000. 

143 



144 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

teachers themselves are, of course, not taxpayers; (3) that 
the women teachers are their beneficiaries. 

In the various estimates that have been pubHshed, the 
most glaring and inconsistent misrepresentations have been 
made. 

As a matter of fact, it has not been possible to give a 
definite and exact estimate of the cost of the " White 
Bill " — the bill passed in 1907 and vetoed by Mayor Mc- 
Clellan and Governor Hughes — because the cost would 
absolutely depend on the schedules made by the Board of 
Education. The bill made mandatory, (a) the raising of 
the minimum salary from $600 to $720; (b) an annual 
increment of at least $105; (c) equal salaries for men 
and women occupying the same position; and (d) no 
salary reduction. It is true that it also made mandatory 
the increase of the three mill appropriation (Sec. 1064, 
Charter) to four mills ; but to say that this meant an arbi- 
trary increase of the proceeds of one mill, is palpably 
false because there has not been a year since the original 
four mill appropriation was reduced to three that the Board 
of Estimate has not been obliged to allow more than the 
amount produced by the three mill provision, this extra 
allowance sometimes exceeding a million dollars. 

UNRELIABILITY OF ESTIMATES 

In proof of the unreliability of the estimates, note the 
following : 

(a) Auditor Cook of the Board of Education, in a com- 
munication addressed to Hon. Abraham Stern, April 26, 
1907, says : " In accordance with your instructions I have 
prepared and present herewith a statement of the approxi- 
mate cost of equalizing salaries of teachers in the public 
schools, so far as relates to the fiscal year 1908, In pre- 
paring this statement, and in the absence of any actual or 
tentative schedules of salaries formulated by the Board of 
Education under authority of the " White " bill, it becomes 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 145 

necessary to assume certain conditions in anticipation, and 
such conditions, as stated and explained by you at a recent 
interview, are understood to be as follows " : 

(b) Mayor McCIellan in his veto message on the 
"White Bill," dated May 10, 1907, said: "As to the 
question of the additional expense which will be forced 
upon the City by this measure, there is considerable dif- 
ferance of opinion." 

(c) Comptroller Metz in letter to me dated March 25, 
1908 said : " I beg to acknowledge your communication 
of the I2th instant requesting me to answer certain ques- 
tions, as indicated below, concerning the several so-called 
women teachers' ' equal pay bills/ which have been pre- 
sented to the Legislature during the present and the pre- 
ceding sessions, and to reply as follows : 

" ' I. Has the Department of Finance made a formal 
estimate of the amount of money necessary to put into 
effect the Conklin Equal Pay Bill of 1908?' 

''It has not. 

" ' 2. Has the Department of Finance made a formal 
estimate of the amount of money that would be required 
to put into effect the Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bill 
reported by the Senate Cities Committee on March 3, 
1908?' 

"It has not. But on the figures submitted by Auditor 
Cook on April 26, 1907, representatives of this department 
have estimated the minimum cost thereof to be not less 
than the amount stated therein $9,109,354, and probably a 
substantial amount greater than that sum. 

" ' 3. Has the Department of Finance asked for a legal 
opinion on, or a legal interpretation of, any of the so-called 
Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bills ? ' 

" It has not. This department has been requested, at 
different times, to furnish an estimate of the amount of 
money that would be required to establish the equal pay 
salary schedule proposed by one or another of said bills 



146 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

but so far no attempt has been made to make such an esti- 
mate, and for the reason that, in my opinion, no such esti- 
mate can be made zvith any approach to exactness because 
the cost of any one of the proposed equal pay bills would 
depend largely upon the salary schedules which the Board 
of Education might see fit to establish in compliance with 
the provisions thereof." 

(d) Mayor McClellan's Commission — Messrs. Schwab, 
Keep and Clark reported : " Your commission find it im- 
possible to make any computation of the probable addi- 
tional cost to the city, which would follow the adoption of 
the provisions of the 'White Bill.'" 

It will be noticed that the Auditor of the board of edu- 
cation did not address his communication to the Board of 
Education but to Mr. Abraham Stern; and not to Mr. 
Stern as chairman of a committee of said board, or even 
as a member of said board, but simply " Mr. Stern." Yet, 
these are the estimates, confessedly based on assumption, 
that have been presented as the estimates of the Board of 
Education, and have been used by the Mayor, the Comp- 
troller, various other officials and individuals and associa- 
tions in opposing " Equal Pay " on account of its cost. 

On March 23, 1908, I sent the following to Mr. Cook : 

Mr. Henry R. Cook, 

Auditor, Board of Education. 
My Dear Mr. Cook : 

Notwithstanding your reply to a recent communication, 
I again write you, and I hope that you will give me direct 
answers to the following questions : 

1. In making your estimate as to the cost of the " White 
Bill " last year, did you have any legal opinion to guide 
you in interpreting such Bill? 

2. Is it not true that in making said estimate, with its 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 147 

total of $9,100,000 and upwards, you worked on an imagi- 
nary set of schedules, which would pay all the teachers in 
the system as if they were male teachers under the ex- 
isting schedules? 

3. Acknowledging that the two clauses " The Board of 
Education shall establish uniform schedules " and " No 
salary of any member of the supervising or teaching force 
shall be reduced," do not compel the Board of Education 
to make schedules which shall include all the individual 
salaries, is it not possible for the Board of Education to 
comply with all the requirements of the " White Bill " 
without going beyond the proceeds of the four-mill tax? 

4. Is it not true that the Davis Law protects the salary 
of a male teacher in grades below those of the seventh and 
eighth years in the Elementary Schools only in an initial 
salary of $900 and an annual increment of $105 ? 

5. Is it not true that the Board of Education is free to- 
day to divide Schedule VI. and make a new schedule for 
male teachers in the grades of the first six years, with a 
maximum to be reached at the end of the fifth, sixth, sev- 
enth, eighth or ninth year, as it might choose? 

I beg for an early reply to this communication and for 
direct answers to these questions, because the estimate 
which you made of the " White Bill "of last year is being 
constantly used against us by the opponents of our bill, 
and we believe that you do not wish to be responsible for 
supplying said opponents with this false charge. 
Yours very truly, 
Grace C. Strachan, 

President Interborough Association 
of Women Teachers. 

I received the following in reply : 

March 30, 1908. 
Dear Miss Strachan: 

I beg to acknowledge receipt of your communication of 
March 23, asking me to answer specifically five questions 



148 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

which you propound in relation to teachers' salary legis- 
lation. 

On February 17, 1908, in response to your letter of Feb- 
ruary 3 bearing on this same subject, I advised you that it 
had been suggested to this Bureau that it is inadvisable 
to issue any official statements, in regard to the teachers' 
salary bill now before the Legislature, except on request 
of the Board of Education or its committees. I now beg to 
advise you that it has been conveyed to me that a continu- 
ation of such attitude on the part of this Bureau is expected. 
Yours very truly, 

Henry R. M. Cook, 
Auditor of the Board of Education. 

It is thus easily seen that the responsibility of the estimate 
of the cost of Equal Pay rests on Mr. Abraham Stern and 
Auditor Cook. Let us read the following in this connec- 
tion : 

The New York Tribune of Friday, May 4, igoo, con- 
tained an article in which it was stated that Auditor Cook 
estimated that " under the Davis Law, principal's salaries 
would in fifteen years become $8,500 for men, and $6,700 
for women." Now, we all know the Davis Law has been 
in effect ten years and no man principal is receiving over 
$3500, or woman, over $2500. 

The Eagle of March 18, 1910. " The vacillating attitude 
of the Board of Education in deciding which parts of the 
city require the erection of new school buildings resulted 
in the laying over of a resolution at the meeting of the 
Board of Estimate to-day, authorizing the issue of corpo- 
rate stock in the sum of $1,845,000 for new buildings. Con- 
troller Pendergast had submitted a report recommending 
the appropriation but at his own request the board deferred 
action. President Winthrop could not explain the budget, 
and Henry Cook, the auditor of the board, was mystified 
just as much." 

Mr. Stern said in opposing the Davis Law, it would cost 
"$26,000,000," but Mr. Maxwell's loth Annual Report 
contains the following table: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 149 

Payments From General School Fund For Salaries Of 
Teachers In Elementary High and Training 
Schools 
Year. 

1898-99 $ 8,059,958.89 

1899-1900 10,583,133.64 

1900-1901 12,587,011.56 

1901-02 13,395,882.38 

1902-03 14,350,802.94 

1903-04 14,885,891.42 

1904-05 15,574,005.00 

1905-06 16,870.891.47 

1906-07 17,582,067.32 

1907-08 18,596,874.70 

The Davis Bill became law July 3, 1900. It appears that 
the salary increase for 1901 was $2,003,877.92. 

' Though Borough President Coler and Comptroller Metz 
rarely agreed while members of the same Board of Esti- 
mate and Apportionment, there is striking agreement in the 
attitude of Mr. Coler on the Davis Bill in 1900, and the 
attitude of Mr. Metz on the White Bill, in 1907, as the 
following quotations prove : 

Comptroller Cole on Davis Bill : 

" It imposes an enormous and unnecessary burden on 
taxpayers ; " 

" Its provisions and the manner in which it became a 
law are bound eventually to demoralize the school system ; " 
" It was opposed by Board of Education ; " 
" It was opposed by many newspapers ; " 
" It was vetoed by Mayor Van Wyck ; " 
" It was forced on city by Republican legislation ; " 
" It was signed by a Republican governor ; " 
" Belief has become common that the organized school- 
teaichers of this city are a political force which it is danger- 
ous to oppose no matter how extravagant their demands 
may be ; " 



I50 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" The bill is a raid on the city treasury ; it takes from 
the control of the Department of Finance $20,000,000 
which is hereafter to be disbursed by irresponsible clerks." 

"It is inevitable that not a few teachers will be found 
drawing higher salaries than Cabinet oihcers, college presi- 
dents or the Governor of New York." 

Comptroller Metz on White Bill : 

" I am and have been of the opinion at all times that 
the proposition to equalize salaries in the Board of Educa- 
tion would cost the city about $13,000,000." 

This is nearl)^ $4,000,000 more than even Auditor Cook's 
extravagant estimate. 

Mr. Coler and Mr. Metz have also agreed in opposing 
the " Equal Pay " bills. 

STUDY OF SCHEDULES 

One of the first questions that was asked us when we 
began our agitation was, " How much will it cost?" And 
so our Executive Committee, carefully selected to repre- 
sent every grade and special subject, worked many weeks 
in the preparation of " Equal Pay " schedules. We were 
unanimous in the opinion that the minimum salaries estab- 
lished for men teachers by the Davis Law should be pre- 
served. So the $900 salary, the minimum fixed by the 
Davis Law for a " male teacher " we made the minimum 
salary for a teacher of boys' or mixed class. The commit- 
tee was unanimous also in the opinion that the present 
bonus of $60 for teachers of boys was insufficient and did 
not attract the necessary supply of women teachers, so we 
fixed $120 as the least, and $180 as the greatest difference 
between the salaries of a teacher of a girls' class and that 
of a teacher of a boys' class of corresponding grade. The 
minimum annual increment for a male teacher fixed by the 
Davis Law we made the annual increment for all classes. 
So far all had gone smoothly. But at this point we found 
ourselves confronted by a discrimination other than salary, 
and in trying to explain this discrimination is that we have 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 151 

found the greatest difficulty in making those unacquainted 
with the technical terms and intimate details of our system 
and of the Davis Law understand.* 

The Davis Bill became law May 3, 1900. The commit- 
tee of the Board of Education which prepared the schedules 
under the new law was headed by Abraham Stern. This 
committee prepared schedules in strict conformity with 
the provisions of the Davis Bill, in every instance but one, 
which exception favored the men, it is embodied in Sched- 
ule VI^ Section 65, of the By-Laws of the Board of Educa- 
tion. The way in which this has effected women teachers 
will be easily understood from a consideration of the pro- 
visions of the Davis Bill, which provided that : 

(a) "No kindergarten or female teacher of the grades 
of the first six years of the elementary schools shall receive 
less than $600 a year ; " 

(b) " No male teacher shall receive less than $900 a 
year ; " 

(c) The annual increment of female teachers as de- 
scribed in (a) shall be not less than $40; 

(d) The annual increment of a male teacher shall be 
not less than $105 ; 

(e) No female teacher as described in (a) shall after 
sixteen years of service receive less than $1240; 

* Two months later, I was elected Associate Superintendent by 
the Brooklyn Board of Education. As principal, I had received the 
maximum salary of $2500. The committee appointed to make 
schedules unler the new law, Mr. Abraham Stern, chairman, rec- 
ommended a salary of $2500 for a " female " district superintendent, 
and $5000 for a " male " district superintendent. Miss Whitney 
had been elected a superintendent in Brooklyn, a year before, and 
was receiving the same salary as the men. It was the manifest 
purpose of the committee to deter women from seeking the posi- 
tion of superintendent by making the salary less in reality than that 
of a principal. I gave up my vacation and brought to bear all the 
social, political and religious influence I could to have the salary 
fixed for district superintendents without the qualifying words 
" male " and " female." The committee's final report included a 
uniform salary of $5000, the ainount then being paid to the district 
superintendents — all men — in Manhattan. 



152 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

(f) No female teacher of the grades of the last two 
years of the elementary schools shall after fifteen years of 
service receive less than $1320; 

(g) No male teacher of the grades of the last two 
years of the elementary schools shall after twelve years 
of service receive less than $2160; 

(h) No female teacher of a graduating class shall after 
ten years of servicel ess than $1440 ; 

(i) No male teacher of a graduating class shall after 
ten years of service receive less than $2,400. 

The comphance with these provisions produced the pres- 
ent schedules of the Board of Education as tabulated below : 



Schedule in. Women. 

Kindergartens and Teachers 
of Grades 1A-6B. 
Mandatory minimum . .$ 600.00 

Mandatory increment .. 40.00 
Year 

1 600.00 

2 640.00 

3 680.00 

4 720.00 

5 760.00 

6 800.00 

7 840.00 

8 880.00 

9 920.00 

10 960.00 

11 1000.00 

12 1040.00 

13 1080.00 

14 1120.00 

15 1160.00 

16 1200.00 

17 1240.00 

Present schedule IV. Grades 
7A-SA. 
i6th year $1320.00 

Present schedule V. Grade 
SB. 
nth year $1440.00 



Schedule VI. Men. 
Mandatory minimum . .$ 900.00 
Mandatory increment. . 105.00 
Year 

1 goo.oo 

2 100500 



(Number of increments left 
to the discretion of the Board 
of Education.) 



Present schedule VI. Grades 
7A— 8A. 

13th year .• $2160.00 

Present schedule VII. Grade 
8B. 
nth year $2400.00 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 153 

The schedules also provided that the female teacher of 
a boys' class or of a mixed class having at least forty per 
cent, of the register, boys, shall receive a bonus of $60 a 
year. The male teacher in charge of a girls' class would 
receive as much as for a boys' class, but it is the practice 
not to place men over girls' classes although there is no 
law or regulation against such procedure, and there has 
been a male teacher of an 8B girls' class. 

The above figures show the cause of the great disparity 
in the estimates of the cost of equal pay. There are three 
definite schedules fixed for female teachers ; there are not 
three definite schedules fixed for male teachers. The Davis 
Laiv failed to Hx a minimum-maximum salary for male 
teachers in grades of the first six years of the course, — in 
other words, a minimum-maximum to correspond to the 
$1240 of Schedule III. 

Now I believe that Mr. Stern's Committee either did not 
notice this lack or they failed to grasp its full significance. 
They realized that under the law there was for male 
teachers a minimum salary of $900; a minimum increment 
of $105; a minimum after twelve years of $2160; but they 
appear not to have realized that the last mentioned salary 
was mandatory only in the last two years of the course, 
namely, in 7A, 7B, 8A, and that they were at liberty in 
grades of the first six years (1A-6B) to cease adding the 
increment of $105 v,^herever they chose to do so. Instead, 
therefore, of making vSchedule VI correspond to Schedule 
III for women, and fixing a maximum in the grades of the 
first six years, less than the $2160 fixed for male teachers 
of the grades of the last two years — just as the $1240 for 
women in the lower grades is less than the $1320 fixed for 
female teachers of the grades of the last two years — Mr. 
Stern's Committee made Schedule VI cover all male 
teachers of grades heloiv the graduating class. This is why 
when we asked the Legislature at Albany to have salaries 
fixed for " teachers of boys' classes " and " teachers of 
girls' classes," instead of for " male teachers " and " female 
teachers," our opponents were able to state that there was 
a male teacher of a 2B grade — a grade of the last half of 



154 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the second year of the course, where the normal child is 
seven and a half years old — who was receiving $2160 a 
year. Mr. Stern held that to comply with our request 
would cost the city of New York over nine million dollars 
because every female teacher in the kindergarten and 
grades lA to 6B inclusive, would after twelve years of 
service have to be given $2160 a year. This statement 
he must have known to be false for the Board of Educa- 
tion is at liberty under the Davis Law to fix any maximum 
it pleases for male teachers of the grades of the first six 
years, limited only by the Davis Law restrictions that the 
minimum be not less than $900 and the annual increments 
not less than $105. 

Our schedules known as the " McCarren Schedues " pro- 
vided that the increment be added seven times, the follow- 
ing schedule resulting therefrom: 

Teachers of Boys' or Mixed Classes 

(Grades 1A-6B) 
Year. 

1st. (Minimum as fixed by the Davis Law) $ 900 
2nd. (Increment of $105 as fixed by the Davis Law) 1005 

3rd. mo 

4th. 12 I 5 

5th. 1320 

6th. 1425 

7th. 1530 

8th. 1635 

INTERBOROUGH ESTIMATES COMPARED WITH BOARD 
ESTIMATES 

That our estimates were correctly made is evidenced by 
the fact that except for the item involved in the foregoing 
explanation, our figures correspond almost exactly with 
those of Auditor Cook. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 155 



Estimate of Interhorough Association of Women Teachers 

(a) 10,012 Women Teachers of Kindergarten 

and grades of first six years . . . .$4,116,915 

(b) 1,044 Teachers of 7 A, 7B, and 8A 742,327 

(c) 329 Teachers of 8B 259,180 

(d) 192 Principals 191,500 

(e) 345 Assistants to Principals 298,000 

(f) 571 High and Training School Teachers 219,130 

12493 Total $5,827,052 



Estimate of Auditor Cook 

(a) 10,077 Women Teachers of Kindergarten 

and grades of first six years. . . .$5,869,550 

(b) 1,049 Teachers of 7A, 7B, and 8A 707,970 

(c) 323 Teachers 8B 251,840 

(d) 191 Principals 191,000 

(s) 345 Assistants to Principals 276,000 

(f) 564 High and Training School Teachers 230,580 

12,549 Total $7,526,940 

Sub. 10,077 Teachers below 7A $5,869,550 

2,472 Teachers and supervising officials 

above 6B $1,657,390 

In estimating item (a) Auditor Cook used a maximum 
of $2160 for all teachers, including kindergarten teachers, 
below 8B. We used $1635 for teachers below 7A. Our 
estimates for the remaining items give an average of 
$689.29 for each of the 2,481 teachers and supervising 
officials above the 6B ; Auditor Cook's give an average of 
$670.46. Thus it is seen that our estimate on these items 
is exorbitant according to the method of computation fol- 
lowed by the Board of Education to the extent of $18.83 



156 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

per teacher, or $235,243.19 for the 12,493 teachers included 
in the estimate. 



To the above total of 

$7,526,940 the auditor's estimate added: 
(g) 188,530 For women appointed since June i, 1906. 
(h) 810,084 For cost of mixed and boys' classes. 
(i) 120,000 For cost of female substitutes, 
(j) 79,000 For cost of filling vacancies, 
(k) 481,000 For cost of difference in increment. 
(1) 248,000 For cost of enlargement of system. 



$9,483,454 Total. _ 
(m) 374,100 Approximate saving on outgoing system. 



$9,109,354 Estimate which was quoted by the Mayor 
and others as the " cost of the bill." 

It is evident that items (g) to (1) inclusive being also 
computed on the $2160 basis are all exorbitant, and greater 
than for the " White Bill " or any other plan of " Equal 
Pay." 

It appears that the auditor did not consider the above 
estimate correct at all times, for the Evening World of 
October 5, 1908, in an article on the " Budget Hearing " of 
the Board of Education said : " Mr. Metz then wanted to 
know how the salary increases suggested compared with 
the increases proposed in the teacher's bill last year. With 
Auditor Cook's help Mr. Winthrop placed the figures at 
$6,500,000 for the bill and $3,500,000 for the budget esti- 
mate." 

$9,000,000 INCREASE NEGLECT OF PRIMARY TEACHER 

There have been many inconsistent arguments made by 
our opponents, and many inconsistent platforms borrowed 
for special occasions, but no inconsistency has been so flag- 
rant in its baldness or so contemptible in its use as that 
involved in this " $2160 estimate." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK is? 

The Board of Education, the Association o£ Male Prin- 
cipals and Teachers, Mayor McClellan, Comptroller Metz, 
and the pitifully small number of citizens' associations that 
opposed us, all used the " Cost " — $9,000,000 and upwards 
(even to $13,000,000 by Mr, Metz) as one reason for their 
opposition, and in the next breath announced as another 
reason — that it, the " Equal Pay " bill, did not provide an 
increase for the " primary teachers." Thus to make one 
false argument, they boosted the estimate to $9,000,000 
by figuring on paying all teachers from kindergarten, to 
8A inclusive, under the $2160 schedule ; and then for an- 
other false argument they claimed that the " primary 
teachers " were neglected by the Interborough. 

In this connection the following item is pertinent : "De- 
cember 17, 1909. The Bureau of Municipal Research has 
asked the press to state that neither it nor its representatives 
have ever declared that an equal pay schedule would cost 
$11,000,000 or of necessity disregard the need of 14,000 
teachers ; no scheme which entirely ignored 14,000 teachers 
could cost $11,000,000. Thus far it has contained itself 
to seeking facts. 

The primary teachers who attended our meetings and 
read our literature knew that almost the whole struggle of 
the Interborough was in their interests. If the " Equal 
Pay" fight concerned only the 2500 women who occupied 
the positions above the 6B grade, it would have been won 
easily. The cost would have been less than $2,000,000. In- 
deed, City Superintendent Maxwell in his report for the 
year ending July 31, 1907, recommended " Equal Pay" for 
women principals. 

But most of the primary teeachers knew that the leaders 
of the Interborough themselves opposed the " White Bill " 
until they succeeded in having incorporated therein the 
amendments: (i) "and that the difference between the 
salary of a teacher of a boys' class of corresponding grade 
shall not be more than $180:" and (2) "at least ninety- 
three percentum of the amount appropriated for the general 
school fund shall be set aside for the payment of the sal- 
aries of the members of the supervising and teaching staff 



158 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

of the regular public day schools of the City of New York." 
The leaders of the women teachers knew that without the 
first amendment above, the board could make the " Equal 
Pay " clause almost ineffective and wholly ridiculous by 
making the difference between the salaries for boys' classes 
and girls' classes as great as or even greater than the pres- 
ent difference between the salaries for male teachers and 
for female teachers. They insisted on the second amend- 
ment to prevent the dissipation of the proceeds of the 
additional fourth mill in evening, summer, and lecture activ- 
ities and increasing salaries of workers therein, other offi- 
cials and attendance officers. They knew that equalization 
would up to the Davis Law Minimums require less than 
thirty per cent, of such proceeds, thus leaving upwards 
of seventy per cent, of same for teachers below the yA 
grade. 

The following resolution adopted by The Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers of the City of New York, 
indicates the attitude of the great majority of the " Pri- 
mary tachers " : 

" At a meeting held at City College, March 20, 1908 : 
Whereas, We know that Mr. Melvin R. Hix, Mr. Bernard 
Cronson, Mr, Edward S. Shumway, and other male 
teachers and principals who are opposing us in our cam- 
paign for Civil Service Salary Schedules, are giving as 
one of their excuses for their indefensible attitude toward 
the women teachers, that our bill now before the legislature 
does not protect ' the primary teachers,' and 

" Whereas, We believe that this expressed interest in the 
welfare of the primary teacher is insincere, and is evidenced 
for the purpose of blinding the members of the legislature, 
the taxpayers, and others to the true motives behind the 
actions of these male opponents ; and 

" Whereas, No ' primary teachers ' have authorized or 
engaged said male opponents of our bill to enter any plea 
in behalf of said * primary teachers,' therefore 

" Resolved, That the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers of the City of New York, resents this unwar- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 159 

ranted reference to any of its members by the opponents of 
the bill which said Association is seeking to enact into law, 
and brands as unworthy a manly man the motives that impel 
said opponents to hide their true colors behind the plea 
that they see in our bill lack of protection for the ' primary 
teacher.' 

" Primary teachers : Emma Osterndorff, P. S. 93, Man- 
hattan ; Emma McCleary, P. S. 16, Brooklyn ; Emma 
Weber, P. S. 62, Queens; Margaret Killion, P. S. 39, 
Bronx; Marie Sweeney, P, S. 17, Richmond. 

" Kindergartner : Martha Poucher, P. S. 32, Bronx." 

IF INCREASES BEFORE EQUAL PAY BEGIN WITH THOSE 
RECEIVING LOWEST SALARY 

Though our male teacher opponents in their attempts to 
weaken our ranks, have tried to make it appear that a few 
of our higher salaried members are actuated by selfish 
motives, our work in decrying the increases for women 
principals and for district superintendents proves the con- 
trary. 

Mrs. Moriarty has always said when " Equal Pay For 
Women Principals " or even increase for principals, was 
under discussion : " Let the principals wait ; begin with the 
lowest salaries." 

The increase of the salary of district superintendent from 
$5000 to $6000 was defeated by only one vote. 

The following letters bear on the subject of this increase: 

The regard in which the proposed increase is held is 
shown by the following letter, written by Grace C. Strachan, 
herself a district superintendent and president of the Inter- 
borough Association of Women Teachers. A copy of this 
letter has been received by every member of the Board of 
Education : 

" Although I believe that the arguments in favor of pay- 
ing District Superintendents a higher salary than that of 



i6o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

any principal are sound, just and reasonable, I take the 
liberty of strongly urging you to postpone your approval 
of the proposed amendment of Section 65 of the By-Laws 
for the purpose of increasing the salary of District Super- 
intendents, until such section is amended for the benefit of 
the grade teachers. 

" The higher salaried members of the Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers have always held that if the 
adjustment of salaries prayed for by said association can- 
not be secured for all members at one and the same time, 
that the beginning shall be made with the lowest salaried 
teachers, namely, the teachers that are paid under Schedule 
III." 

To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

While it is true that I objected to the increase of the 
district superintendents' salaries, I do not wish to be mis- 
understood in this connection or to receive any credit to 
which I am not entitled, and so I feel constrained to state 
that I believe the salary of a district superintendent should 
be greater than that of any principal. At present the prin- 
cipal of a high or a training school is paid the same salary 
as a district superintendent. Yet no one will deny that a 
district superintendent has greater responsibility, heavier 
labor and greater official expenses. For instance, during 
the past summer I had twenty-six vacation schools, vacation 
playgrounds and evening playgrounds, which I was obliged 
to inspect and report on formally, including in my report 
a rating for each individual teacher. 

If a high school principal works in one of these vacation 
playgrounds or schools he or she is paid a regular per 
diem salary. In like manner, I am obliged to examine the 
evening schools in my districts and report on them at least 
twice in the year and rate each principal and teacher. 
Should a high school principal take the principalship of an 
evening school, he would receive $7 a night. 

The traveling and restaurant expenses absolutely incum- 
bent upon district superintendents are naturally much 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK i6i 

greater than those of a high school principal. While the 
high school principal has but one school to reach every day 
and can have a permanent luncheon place, the district super- 
intendent has often twenty or more schools. Besides all 
this, a district superintendent is elected for a limited time, 
while a principal has a permanent tenure after the first 
three years. 

For all these reasons I think that the salary of district 
superintendent should be higher than that of high school 
principal. I think further that it should be a higher salary 
than that of a member of the board of examiners, and I 
hope that the necessary adjustment may soon be properly 
made. However, I shall continue to object to any increases 
in the salaries of the higher paid officials until the salaries 
of the teachers — especially the teachers in the schedules 
running from $600 to $1240 — have been increased, accord- 
ing to the schedules approved by the Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers. 

Grace C. Strachan. 

Brooklyn, December 28, 1909. 

EQUAL PAY IN INSTALMENTS 

The Bureau of Municipal Research has said : " If the 
Board of Education has been wasting hundreds of thou- 
sands of dollars in paying extra * salaries to men for work 
which women could have done just as well, this should be 
frankly admitted.' I have elsewhere shown that in one 
school with I26(?) boys in seven classes, seven men were 
employed. I know of another school which with 74 boys 
in classes above 6B, was costing the city $3500 for a male 
principal, and $2400 for a male teacher in the 8B class of 
15 boys and 19 girls." 

Furthermore, that our Association has been not only will- 
ing but anxious to lessen to the taxpayer the burden of 
establishing our " Equal Pay " principle, is proven by our 
Gledhill-Foley bill (1909) and the Somers' resolution 
(1910.) The former provides "that each member of the 



i62 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

teaching and supervising staff shall at once become entitled 
to all the emolument in accordance with above schedule 
to which said person is entitled by reason of merit, experi- 
ence and position held ; but the Board of Education may 
limit the expense of putting these schedules into effect by 
making the highest salary to be paid to any teacher or su- 
pervisor in the year 1910 and each year thereafter until the 
maximum salary shall have been reached, the salary in the 
proposed schedule which is equal to or next higher than 
the amount that would be obtained by adding two of the 
annual increments in said schedule to the salary due said 
teacher or supervisor under the present schedule." 

The Somers' resolution provided: "That such revised 
schedules be put into effect as soon as funds sufficient there- 
fore are provided by the Board of Estimate and Apportion- 
ment, and that pending full financial ability, the increases 
in women teachers' salaries be paid in annual instal- 
ments which shall be not less than twenty per cent, of the 
difference between the maximum salaries now ffxed for men 
and the maximum salaries now Uxed for women occupying 
the same position, except that for the year 1910 there shall 
be a flat increase of not less than $120 per annum for all 
women teachers below the 7A grade and not less than $120 
for all women teachers of special subjects." 

That this has been the disposition of the Interborough 
from the beginning, is shown by an article that appeared in 
the Globe of March 11, 1907. 

Later, I called on Mr. Abraham Stern and told him we 
were willing to spread the increase over three or four 
years, and that we would like to incorporate a clause making 
such provision in our bill. He said such a clause would 
probably render our bill unconstitutional, and realizing 
that he was a lawyer, we dropped the matter. 

The Globe article described a meeting of our Executive 
Committee and said : " Serious consideration was also 
given to an amendment which would limit the immediate 
increase in expense to the city. The question was raised 
as to whether such amendment would not invalidate the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 163 

bill, and pending a legal opinion on this point, action has 
been postponed. 

" If it is found that such a provision can be incorporated 
in the bill without invalidating it, an amendment will be 
prepared. Just what the amendment will be it is impossible 
to state definitely at this time. It is agreed that every 
teacher now in the system receiving less than $900 should 
on January i, next, be raised to the minimum provided in 
the law, and that thereafter should receive an annual in- 
crease of $105. Although opinions differ, there are many 
who believe that those who would receive an immediate 
increase of more than a certain sum — probably $400 — 
should receive such increase in two or more annual instal- 
ments according to the amount of the increase. It is also 
agreed that any teacher having served twenty years or more 
on January i should be immediately raised to the minimum 
maximum fixed in the law. Nothing definite has been 
decided as yet regarding this matter." 

ANALYSIS OF BOARD'S SCHEDULES 

THE BOARD OBJECTS TO 4 MILL TAX, BUT ASKS FOR $S,o6o,- 
469.02 IN EXCESS OF 3 MILL TAX 

An anomaly has been presented by the board's opposition 
to the four mill clause in our Equal Pay bills and its presen- 
tation of schedules in the budget of 1909 calling for an in- 
crease in the general fund which required $5,060,469.02 in 
addition to the three mill tax. Of this increase $3,273,163.52 
was for increases in salaries. 

Ever since Governor Hughes in his veto message on the 
" White Bill," declared that in the present schedules there 
are "glaring inequalities that clearly should not be per- 
mitted to continue," the board has been on record as asking 
for increase in salaries. The public generally has always 
supposed that their action in this connnection indicated a 
great victory for the women teachers, but that this sup- 
position is not borne out by facts and figures, the following 
shows : 



i64 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



REPORT OF AUDITOR OF THE INTERBOROUGH ASSOCIATION 
FIGURES 

To the Board of Education : 

I have the honor to comply with your directions of Janu- 
ary 26, 1910, (see Journal, page 224), to verify the figures 
contained v^^ithin a communication of the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers relating to the tentative 
schedules of teachers' salaries adopted by the Board of 
Education in 1907 and 1908, and included within the annual 
budgets submitted to the Board of Estimate and Appor- 
tionment for 1908, 1909 and 1910. 

The statements containing said figures follow in categor- 
ical order : 

I. " The maximum of the kindergarten teachers is raised 
$20, while the maximum of the male first assistant of the 
high school is raised $500-" (Statement by I. A. W. T.) 

The above statement is literally correct, but it is only 
a small part of a full comparison of these two extremes 
of the teaching corps. A more complete analysis shows : 

The minimum salary of a kindergartner is raised from 
$600 to $660 per annum, or $60, an increase of 10 per cent. 
The maximum salary is raised from $1240 to $1260 per 
annum, or $20, an increase of 1.61 per cent., but such 
maximum salary is reached in sixteen years under the pro- 
posed plan as against seventeen years under the present 
method. The annual increment of $40 is unchanged. 

A hypothetical person serving for seventeen years under 
this schedule would earn $15,640 under the present method, 
and $16,620 under the proposed plan, an increase of $980, 
or 6.26 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the 739 kindergartners now 
employed is, under the present method, $823.38, and, under 
the proposed plan, $882.73, an average increase of $59.35 
per person, or 7.2 per cent. There are now but twelve 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 165 

kiiidergartners in the maximum salary year, and these 
would be increased from $1240 to $1260 per annum. 

The y2y remaining kindergartners would each receive an 
increase of $60 per annum. The aggregate annual increase 
for kindergartners is $43,860. 

The minimum salary of a male first assistant in high and 
training schools is raised from $2500 to $2900 per annum, 
or $400, an increase of 16 per cent. The maximum salary 
is raised from $3000 to $3500 per annum, or $500, an 
increase of 16.66 per cent., but such maximum salary is 
reached in four years under the proposed plan as against 
six years under the present method. The annual increment 
is increased from $100 to $200, or 100 per cent. 

A hypothetical person serving for six years under this 
schedule would earn $16,500 under the present method and 
$19,800 under the proposed plan, an increase of $3300, or 
20 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the eighty-seven male first 
assistants affected by the change of rate is, under the pres- 
ent method, $2,795.40, and under the proposed plan, 
$3,311.49, an average increase of $516.09 per person, or 
18.46 per cent. The aggregate annual increase for these 
persons is $44,900. 

2. " The annual increment of the primary teacher is 
raised $8 ; that of the teacher of the seventh and eighth 
3^ears, $0; while the annual increment of the male first 
assistant in the high school is raised $100." (Statement by 
I. A. W. T.) 

This statement is literally correct, but, as a basis for 
judgment, it is insufficient. 

The minimum salary of a woman teacher of grades from 
lA to 6B, inclusive, is raised from $600 to $720 per annum, 
or $120, an increase of twenty per cent. The maximum 
salary is raised from $1240 to $1440 per annum, or $200, 
an increase of 16.12 per cent., but such maximum salary is 
reached in sixteen years under the proposed plan, as against 
seven years under the present method. The annual incre- 



i66 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ment is increased from $40 to $48 an increase of twenty 
per cent. 

A hypothetical person serving for seventeen years under 
this schedule would earn $15,640 under the present method 
and $18,720 under the proposed plan, an increase of $3,080, 
or 19.69 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the 10,768 women teachers 
now employed in Schedule III (grades from lA to 6B, in- 
clusive) is, under the present method, $913.69, and, under 
the proposed plan, $1,088.85, an average increase of $175.16 
per person, or 19.16 per cent. The aggregate annual in- 
crease for these persons is $1,886,108. 

The minimum salary of women teachers of grades from 
7A to 8A inclusive, is raised from $600 to $720 per annum, 
or $120, an increase of twenty per cent. The maximum 
salary is raised from $1320 to $1440 per annum or $120, 
an increase of 9.09 per cent. The life of the schedule re- 
mains the same, namely, sixteen years. The annual incre- 
ment of $48 is unchanged. 

A hypothetical person serving for sixteen years under 
this schedule would earn $15,360 under the present method, 
and $17,280 under the proposed plan, an increase of $1,920, 
or 12.5 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the 1380 women teachers 
now employed in Schedule IV (grades from 7A to 8A in- 
clusive) is, under the present method, $1252.97, and under 
the proposed plan, $1373.14, an average increase of $120.17 
per person, or 9.59 per cent. The aggregate annual in- 
crease for these persons is $165,840. 

The schedule for male first assistants in high schools is 
analyzed under Statement i, preceding. 

3. " Even the annual increments of the clerical assistants 
and library assistants in high schools are raised $50 — that 
is, 100 per cent. — in contrast to the twenty per cent increase 
given to the primary teachers, and the o per cent, given to 
kindergarten teachers and those of the seventh and eighth 
years of the elementary schools. Contrast the $20 increase 
in the maximum of the kindergartner to the $400 increase 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK id; 

in the maximum of the high school library assistants." 
(Statement by I. A. W. T.) 

This statement is literally correct but, as a basis for 
judgment it is insufficient. 

The minimum salary of a woman clerical assistant in 
high and training schools remains at $700 per annum. The 
maximum salary is raised from $1000 to $1200 per annum, 
or $200, an increase of twenty per cent, but such maximum 
salary is reached in six years under the proposed plan as 
against seven years under the present method. The annual 
increment is increased from $50 to $100, an increase of 
100 per cent. 

A hypothetical person serving for seven years under this 
schedule would earn $5950 under the present method and 
$6900 under the proposed plan, an increase of $950, or 
15.96 per cent 

The average annual salary of the ten women clerical as- 
sistants affected by the change of rate is, under the present 
method, $899, and, under the proposed plan, $1050. an 
average increase of $151 per person, or 16.79 P^^ cent. The 
aggregate annual increase for these persons is $1510. 

The minimum salary of a male clerical assistant in high 
schools is raised from $900 to $1000 per annnum, or $100, 
an increase of 11. 11 per cent. The maximum salary is 
raised from $1200 to $1500 per annum, or $300, an increase 
of 25 per cent., but such maximum salary is reached 
in six years under the proposed plan, as against seven years 
under the present method. The annual increment is in- 
creased from $50 to $100, an increase of 100 per cent. 

A hypothetical person serving for seven years under thij 
schedule would earn $7350 under the present method, and 
$9000 under the proposed plan, an increase of $1650, or 
22.44 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the five male clerical assist- 
ants affected by the change of rate is, under the present 
method, $1120, under the proposed plan, $1400, an average 
increase of $280 per person, or twenty-five per cent The 
aggregate annual increase for these persons is $1400. 



i68 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The minimum salary of women library assistants in higH 
and training schools is raised from $700 to $800 per annum, 
or $100, an increase o^ 14.28 per cent. The maximum sal- 
ary is raised from $1,000 to $1,400 per annum, or $400, an 
increase of 40 per cent. The life of the schedule remains 
the same, namely, 7 years. The annual increment is 
increased from $50 to $100, an increase of 100 per 
cent. 

A hypothetical person serving for 7 years under this 
schedule would earn $5,950 under the present method and 
$7,700 under the proposed plan, an increase of $1,750, or 
29.41 per cent. 

The average annual salary of the 31 women library as- 
sistants now employed is, under the present method, $950, 
and, under the proposed plan, $1,300, an average increase 
of $350 per person, or 36.84 per cent. The aggregate an- 
nual increase for these persons is $4,550. 

There were no men library assistants included in the 
budget for 1910. 

The schedules for kindergartners and male first assistants 
in high schools are analyzed under statement i, preceding, 
but it is necessary, in the interest of particularity, to again 
state that, of the 739 kindergartners now employed, only 
12 have reached the maximum year. These 12 would re- 
ceive increases of $20 each. 

4. " Again, this budget includes an average increase of 
$363.14 for each of the 560 men in the high schools, while 
the 9,971 women in the elementary schools would receive 
only an average increase of $177.07." The budget of the 
Board of Education for 1910, showing the teachers actually 
employed May 31, 1909, has been used as a basis for pre- 
paring the two tables of analysis presented herewith." — 
(Statement by I. A. W. T.) 

The budget shows that 14,751 women of all classes would 
receive an aggregate increase of $2,639,762, representing 
an increase of average salary from $1,033.42 to $1,212.37, 
or $178.95 per person, or 17.31 per cent. 

The budget also shows that 582 men of all classes would 
receive an aggregate increase of $206,215, representing an 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 169 

increase of average salary from $2,144.34 to $2,498.66, or 
$354.32 per person, or 16.52 per cent. 

The statement regarding 9,971 women and 560 men is, 
therefore, incorrect. There is a wide discrepancy between 
the number of persons referred to in this paragraph of the 
circular and the actual number as found in the budget. — ■ 
(The 9,971 is the number of women in grades i A — 6 B. 
Inclusive. The 560 is the number of men high school 
teachers. — Grace C. Strachan.) 

5. " In the special subjects we find teachers of music, 
sewing, drawing and physical training with an increase in 
their maximum of $300 to $400, while the teachers of cook- 
ing receive no increase — that is, the teachers of music and 
physical training receive $600 more than the teachers of 
cooking."— (Statement by I. A. W. T.) 

This statement is imperfectly framed and thus leads to 
seeming ambiguity. (The statement refers to maximums 
and is absolutely correct regarding them. — Grace C. 
Strachan.) 

In the schedule for women teachers of music and draw- 
ing the minimum salary remains the same, namely, $1,000 
per annum ; the annual increment also remains the same, 
namely, $100 per annum. The life of the schedule, how- 
ever, is extended from 5 years to 9 years, making the max- 
imum salary $1,800 per annum, instead of $1,400 per 
annum. 

In the schedule for women teachers of sewing and shop- 
work, the minimum salary remains the same, namely, $900 
per annum ; the annual increment also remains the same, 
namely, $100 per annum. The life of the schedule, how- 
ever, is extended from 4 years to 7 years, making the maxi- 
mum salary $1,500 per annum, instead of $1,200 per annum. 

In the schedule for women teachers of physical training 
the minimum salary is increased from $900 per annum to 
$1,000 per annum. The annual increment remains the same, 
namely, $100 per annum; but the life of the schedule is 
extended from 4 years to 9 years, making the maximum sal- 
ary $1,800 per annum, instead of $1,200 per annum. 

In the schedule for men teachers of music and drawing 



lyo EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the minimum salary remains the same, namely, $1,200 per 
annum; the annual increment also remains the same, 
namely, $100, but the life of the schedule is extended from 
5 years to 9 years, making the maximum salary $2,000 per 
annum, instead of $1,600 per annum. 

14,764 women teachers receive increase of $2,639,927 
581 men " " " " 206,050 



15,345 $2,845,977 

Average of women's increase $178.80 
Average of men's increase $354.65 

These figures are substantially correct. 

Permit me to point out that neither the figures of the 
Teachers' Association as to difference of minimums, maxi- 
mums, and increments, nor the comments of this bureau 
thereon, should, of themselves, be accepted as either proof 
or disproof of the correctness of the basic principles of 
either or both the present method or the proposed plan of 
fixing teachers' salaries. Such figures are infallible only 
in the restricted sense that they are correct arithmetical re- 
sults ; such figures are not conclusive as to the fundamental 
correctness or incorrectness of either of the factors used, 
namely, the present method, on the one hand, or the pro- 
posed plan on the other. 

The point to be borne in mind is that, granting the basic 
salaries for the several classes of teachers to be equitably 
determined after consideration of all appropriate factors, 
then any mere recital of the resultant differences between 
the present method and the proposed plan is simply an 
expression or statement of previous " inequalities " reduced 
to arithmetical terms. In other words, the principle in- 
volved is not what is the increase in the minimum or the 
maximum salary of one class of teacher as compared with 
another class, nor, again, as to whether the annual incre- 
ment is increased or not ; the question is solely as to whether 
the proposed schedules are equitable and just, and, if that 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 171 

be demonstrated, then the increase of the proposed plan 
over the present method is simply a matter of mathematics 
and not of argument — that is, the increase merely repre- 
sents the cost of making perfect that which is imperfect. 
Respectfully submitted, 

Henry R. M. Cook, 
Auditor of the Board of Education. 
February 18, 1910. 

And yet the schedules are presented as being " For the 
women teachers." And because we tried to make the facts 
clear to the Board of Estimate and the public, and because 
we appeared before said board to present the following 
resolutions. Senator Travis, in the speech in which he tried 
to excuse his vote against our bill in 1908 after voting for 
it in 1907, and still insisting that he believed in " Equal 
Pay/' asked : " Who were the people that opposed the ad- 
justment of these inequalities? They were the women 
teachers, represented by their leader. Miss Strachan, who 
demanded that the Board of Estimate veto the appropria- 
tion." A study of our resolutions will show that this was 
not any more accurate than the same senator's expressions 
on the cost of our bill. 

October 3, 1908. 

At the regular bi-monthly meeting of the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers the following resolutions 
were adopted : 

" Resolved, That the action of the Interborough Associ- 
ation of Women Teachers on the new salary schedules 
which the Board of Education has included in its budget 
for the year 1908, be as follows : 

" 1st. Approval of all parts of such schedules as reduce 
the present discriminations against women teachers and 
supervisors. 

" 2d. Disapproval of all parts of such schedules as in- 
crease the salaries of men already receiving more than 
women occupying the same position. 

" 3d. Disapproval of all parts of such schedules as tend 
to impair the value of the Kindergarten and of Domestic 



172 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Science in our School System ; and be it further resolved : 
That this action of the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers be presented to the Board of Estimate, either per- 
sonally, through one of its officers, or in written form, on 
the occasion of the public hearing set by said Board on the 
Budget of the Board of Education for the year 1909; and 
be it further resolved, 

" That the Interborough Association of Women Teachers 
prays the Board of Estimate to take such action as will 
cause the said salary schedules to be so amended that men 
and women occupying the same position in the public 
schools of our city shall receive the same pay." 

The resolution was adopted unanimously October 3, 1908. 
790 delegates present. Similar resolutions were adopted 
October 9, 1909. 

On October 15, 1908, we sent the following letter to the 
Board of Estimate: 

" To the Members of the Board of Estimate and Appor- 
tionment: 
" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers 
submits the following specific instances of ways in which 
the Educational Budget may be decreased, by denying the 
proposed increases to male teachers in High and Training 
Schools : 

*' High Schools — 

Male Clerical Assistants, 4 — Total increase, $ 1,000 

Male Library Assistant, i — " " 330 

Male Junior Teachers, 17 — " " i,igo 

Male Assistant Teachers, 439 — " " 145,420 

Male First Assistants, 64 — " " 33.300 



Total for High School Teachers $181,150 

Training School for Teachers — 

Male Assistant Teachers, 9 — Total increase, $ 2,620 

Male First Assistants, 8— " " 3,100 



Total for Training School Teachers $ 5>720 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 173 

" It will thus be seen that the sum of $186,870 can be 
deducted from the Budget by denying these proposed in- 
creases to male teachers, whose salaries without said pro- 
posed increases will still be greater than the salaries of 
women occupying the same position, even should the in- 
creases proposed in the women's salaries be granted. 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers re- 
spectfully suggests that a further saving could be made, 
while the city continues to pay women teachers less than 
men occupying the same position, by replacing male teach- 
ers in charge of girls' classes in the elementary schools by 
women teachers. It is well known that in at least one 
school in Manhattan, there are no women teachers in the 
grades of the last two years, although there are many girl 
pupils in such grades. 

" Respectfully submitted, . 

" Grace C. Strachan, 

" President." 

In the discussion resulting in the Board of Estimate, 
October 4,. 1908, on the presentation of these schedules, the 
following facts were emphasized : 

The per capita cost of pupil in high school, . . $90.00 
The per capita cost of pupil in College of the city 

of New York, $185.50 

The per capita cost of pupil in Normal College, . $5.13 

Mr. Maxwell's Tenth Annual Report shows: 

Per capita cost of pupil in Elementary School, . $31.61 

High Schools, . . $92.30 

Nautical School, . . $338.27 

Per capita cost of pupil in Training Schools 

(Theory Department), $102.69 

Per capita cost of pupil in Truant School, . . $58.03 

This is estimated on average daily attendance, and in- 
cludes onlv the cost based on salaries. When it is con- 



5) 5) 



174 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

sidered that the salaries of superintendents, examiners, 
directors, and other attendance officers are all classed with 
the expenditures for elementary schools, and when it is 
further considered that the cost per pupil of scholastic sup- 
plies, including library books and apparatus, is less for the 
elementary schools than for any other, it is evident that the 
cost of a high school pupil is three times that of an elemen- 
tary school pupil, while six pupils could be paid for in ele- 
mentary school with the cost of one boy in New York City 
College. Even the boy in the Truant school costs 83.8 per 
cent, more than the boy in the elementary school, although 
the salary of the truant officer is added to the other expen- 
ses of the elementary school boy. As for the Nautical 
school, that is a record breaker indeed. Almost eleven boya 
could be taught in elementary school for the average cost 
of one boy on the School Ship, based on expenditures for 
salaries of officers, for sustenance and crew. 

Poor elementary school pupil and poor elementary school 
teacher! And yet what is the reason for our public school 
system? Is it not the education of the elementary school 
pupils? Should not our first thought be of them? Should 
not our greatest efforts be toward perfecting our system 
in regard to them? Yet the contrarry is true. The course 
of study is planned not for the ninety-five per cent that 
never even finish the elementary school course, not even 
for the five per cent that do graduate from the elementary 
schools, but for the pitiful fraction of one per cent that 
enter college. 

And yet we are treated to false appeals for more money 
to get " more men teachers in the high schools " when sta- 
tistics show there are already more men for the high school 
boys than there are women for the high school girls! 

MONEY FOR OTHKR INCREASES 

Speaking of Mayor McClellan's excuse for his veto of 
the Equal Pay for Teachers Bill — that it would cost $13, 
000,000 and the city could not afford it — Mr. Towns com- 
mented caustically upon the record of the present adminis- 




Hon. James W. Wadsworth, Jr., 

Speaker of Assembly During the Four Years of "Equal Pay" 
Fight. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 175 

tration, stating that it was the first time the Mayor had 
shown timidity in spending the people's money freely. 

" Beside the amount of money he has spent," said Mr. 
Towns, " this teacher's increase apportionment might be 
icompared with an attempt to start a fertilizing factory with 
one small canary bird on the highest peak of Mount Chim- 
borazo." 

During all this time that we were being opposed on the 
ground of greater expense to taxpayer, employees of other 
departments were receiving increases. 

In a pamphlet by Comptroller Metz, entitled " Cost of 
Government of the City of New York," with an analysis 
of the Budget for the year 1909, appears on page 34, " the 
necessity for this action I personally regret, for some pro- 
vision,, I believe, should have been made for the increase of 
the salaries of the teachers in the elementary schools, of 
Police Lieutenants and Sergeants and fourth grade firemen 
and Patrolmen, and there should have been allowances for 
the increase of salaries of many worthy employees in the 
various Departments, but in the interests of economy I 
joined with my associates in the Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment for a Budget which should contain no salary 
increases whatever." 

Being myself a taxpayer as well as a school teacher, such 
press articles as the following naturally had a special at- 
traction for me during the years, that the Board of Esti- 
mate was denying our appeal. 

The Brooklyn Eagle, May 28, 1909. " The city may be 
too poor to build subways. The debt limit may always be 
iconveniently used as a bugaboo. But, to use a vernacular 
expression of a Tammany man, there was a ' jail delivery' 
of salary increases on the calendar of the Board of Esti- 
mate to-day. 

" Here are a few of the increases which Controller Metz 
seeks to make. They were all reported upon favorably by 
the select committee on salaries, of which Mr. Metz is a 
member. The first two fix the grade of examiner in the 
Finance Department at $5,000 a year for two incumbents. 
One of the men whom the controller intends to favor was 



176 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

receiving a salary of $1,050 when Mr. Metz came into 
office. 

" That is not all for the Finance Department. For the 
chief bookkeeper, Mr. Metz has provided a $1,000 increase. 
The chief auditor is similarly favored. The head of the law 
and adjustment division is also given a $1,00 increase. 

" There are two other examiners in the Finance Depart- 
ment, whom Mr. Metz evidently believes should be favored 
with an increase in salary. For them he intends to fix 
$3,000 each. The deputy collector of assessments and ar- 
rears in Manhattan also finds it hard to get along on his 
present salary, so Mr. Metz has decided to raise it to $4,000- 
Then there are two accountants to whom Mr. Metz pro- 
poses to give salaries, respectively $2,400 and $2,500. 

" President Coler is just as lavish as Mr. Metz. He pro- 
poses the establishment of clerk to the local improvement 
boards at $3,000 per annum. So that some of the inspectors 
of plumbing in the Building Department may receive an 
increase he proposes the fixing of a grade at $2,400. To 
the man who drives Mr. Coler's automobile he has decided 
to give a $300 increase, fixing his salary at $1,500. 

The chief engineer of the bureau of sewers, Mr. Coler 
believes, is being underpaid unless he receives a salary of 
$6,000. A resolution fixing the salary at that amount was 
accordingly introduced. The same opinion evidently is 
entertained by Mr. Coler toward the chief engineer of the 
bureau of highways and the chief engineer of the bureau 
of sewers. The salary of both officials is fixed at $6,000. 

Then comes the superintendent of Mr. Coler's municipal 
asphalt plant. Mr. Coler proposed to fix his salary at 
$2,500. But for the man who is known as the searcher in 
his office, Mr. Coler also proposed an increase. His salary 
in the future will be $1,800. 

Altogether 139 salary increases were on the calendar. 
Besides Mr. Metz and Mr. Coler, the health department and 
the other borough presidents divided the honors." 

The Eagle of June 5, 1909, said editorially : " Increases 
for 139 city employees passed the Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment. For example, $3,000 is a good fat salary 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 177 

for the clerk to the local improvement boards of Brooklyn. 
Engineers of the Bureau of Sewers and of Highways, are, 
of course, technical positions, but you can hire pretty good 
engineers for less than $6,000, the salary fixed for those 
positions. Nobody wants the city to be niggardly in its 
pay, but between that and wholesale extravagance there is 
room to draw the line of justice tinged with generosity." 

The total sum of the increases in the municipal depart- 
ments, exclusive of fire, police and school departments, for 
the six months' period, commencing Jan, i, 1907, to July 
I, 1907, was $633,021.70. 

Coler's Bulletin: 

" But there are other specifications. 

" Not to mention the Kissena Park land purchases, the 
purchase of waterfront property for ten millions, whose 
assessed valuation was only one-fifth that amount, and a 
dozen other little real estate deals of that kind, there is the 
astounding waste in the Catskill watershed, where land 
commissioners are paid fifty dollars a day, and where a 
contract bid is thrown out for no apparent reason than that 
it is two million dollars lower than the bid which is ac- 
cepted. 

" There is the nine million dollar subway made useless 
by reason of the failure of the city to S:omplete it. 

" There is the Queensboro Bridge, built at a cost of 
twenty million dollars, and so overloaded with steel as to 
make it dangerous and to involve ani admitted waste of two 
million dollars. In order to make this bridge safe the steel 
had to be taken ofif again, and the provision for elevated 
railroad service had to be abandoned. This reduces the 
capacity of the bridge one-half. It was of this bridge that 
the Scientific American said, it was the greatest engineer- 
ing blunder in bridge construction. It was at the celebra- 
tion of this bridge opening that an observer remarked: 
' Could there be anything more absurd than the parade of 
the bridge engineers. It is like a procession of doctors at 
the funeral of a victim of their blunders.' 



178 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

^'The reduction of its capacity one-half and the actual 
cost of the excess steel on this bridge make a total of waste 
amounting to $12,000,000. 

" Another item is thq construction of a three-and-a-quar- 
ter-million terminal of the Brooklyn Bridge, instead of 
adopting the simple Poulsen plan of bridge relief which can 
be installed for a quarter of a million." 

Mr. William M. Hoge says: "We are only getting on 
the fringe of it " in Article on " How New York City is 
fleeced out of Millions," written for Eagle, Dec. 5, 1909, 
by Frederick Boyd Stevenson. 

The New York American, Dec. 30, 1909, said : Comp- 
troller will show it up in Report — Some prices quadruple- 
Yearly waste $50,000,000. 

The statement of Supreme Court Justice Wesley O. 
Howard of Troy, that 40 per cent of money appropriated 
for public use is lost in graft, was echoed yesterday by 
President-elect John Purroy Mitchel, of the Board of Al- 
dermen, and by Comptroller Metz. Justice Howard was 
provoked to the declaration by the size of a bill presented 
to him by condemnation commissioners on the Catskill 
watershed. 

" It is impossible to fix an] average percentage of graft," 
said Mr. Mitchel, who, as Commissioner of Accounts, has 
exposed graft continuously for three years, " In some 
cases, the graft is more than 40 per cent," and in other 
cases less. It's as high as 200 per cent, and even more, in 
some of the transactions we have uncovered. I don't think 
it is possible, though, to average graft." 

" Graft in condemnation proceedings exceeds 40 per 
cent," said Comptroller Metz. " Judge Howard is talking 
about a graft I have been showing up ever since I became 
Comptroller. I'll show you in a day or two, when I make 
my report on condemnation public just how much con- 
demnation graft there has been in this town. In some 
pieces the graft is looo per cent ; in others it isn't more 
than 10 per cent. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 179 

" There is waste in some contracts and graft in others, 
but there is no estimating the amount. All I know is that 
the city finds itself * stuck ' to the tune of millions each 
year. On small things, where open order contracts are 
given by some department heads, I have found the size of 
the bills tripled and quadrupled. If that ain't graft, what 
is it? 

" Testimony taken by the Legislative Investigating 
Committee last winter showed that an average of 25 per 
cent o£ the money spent by the city annually is wasted. 
The annual expenditure for all purposes exceeds $200,000,- 
000, so the annual waste which might come under Judge 
Howard's classification of graft is $50,000,000." 

UNPAID TAXES 

I think that it would be better for the taxpayers who 
oppose our bill to divert their energies toward assisting 
the city to collect its unpaid taxes. It must be realized 
that whatever the cost of " Equal Pay," it is simply the 
measure of the injustice the women teachers are laboring 
under. Those who emphasize this cost, including the 
Board of Education, seem not to realize that the greater 
the estimate placed on this injustice, the greater the crime 
exposed. But even the nine million, eleven million, thir- 
teen million dollar estimates sink into insignificance when 
compared with the estimate of Unpaid Taxes, 

The State Board of Tax Commissioners in annual report 
for 1906, stated in connection with unpaid franchise taxes : 
" In Greater New York alone these unpaid taxes reach the 
large total of $18,476,585.54." 

The World, December 17, 1908: "By request of Gov. 
Hughes, the new charter commission made to him yester- 
day a special report upon city finances. After showing 
that the city on Nov. i, was within $8,582,705 of the limit 
of its borrowing capacity, the report that the borrowing 
capacity at the moment is so limited is manifestly due, 
among other things, to the fact of the city's failure to col- 



i8o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

lect its taxes and assessments. There was due the city on 
Nov. I, 1908, for unpaid taxes and assessments for the year 
1906 and prior years, the following: — 

Real Estate Taxes, $ 9,418,708 

Special Franchise Taxes, , 17,964,830 

Personal Property Taxes, 32,346,528 

Assessments (to date) about 26,000,000 



$85,730,066 

In 1909 Mr. Ivins wrote Gov. Hughes that New York 
City had exceeded its debt limit by more than $5,000,000. 
Gen. Tracy, as referee, fixed the debt limit at 106 millions 
and upwards. 

OUR TAXES COMPARED WITH OTHERS 

That our taxes are not abnormally large is shown by the 
following from the New York Evening Post : " The average 
annual burden (of taxation) on the head of every Japa- 
nese family amounts to 1.5 of his average income. A com- 
parison of 20% in Japan is made with England 9.9 ; France 
12.2; Germany 7.9; America 3.2; Italy 20.3; Austria 20.6." 
Compare' an annual average burden of taxation on the head 
of every American family of 3.2 per cent with England 
8.9; France 12.2; Germany 7.9; Italy 20.3. Many Ameri- 
cans are content with this system of economy that to a 
great extent results in the over-crowding of school-rooms 
and the overwork and underpay of school teachers." 

The Globe, of October 18, 1907, in an article on the 
meeting of the State Department of Superintendents said: 
" The general question of teachers' salaries was discussed 
at the afternoon session, when Supt. R. A. Taylor, of Niag- 
ara Falls, presented the results of his investigations as to 
' Prevailing Methods of Grading the Salaries of Teachers.' 
It wasi something of a surprise to those present, particularly 
the people from New York City, to learn that New York 
City is not the banner salary city. It devotes only .776 per 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK i8i 

cent of the money raised by taxation to teachers' salaries, 
whereas Mechanicsville gives .857, Newburgh .810 and 
Salamanca and Elmira .780 each. It was also reported that 
the minimum salary in a number of the small cities is the 
same or higher than that in New York City. Cities regis- 
tering less than 1000 students devote 28 per cent of their 
school money to teachers' salaries ; those having from 2000 
to 3000 pupils devote 62,.2, per cent ; those having from 3000 
to 5000 devote 70.9 per cent ; those over 5000, 67.3 per cent. 
The state average is about 65 per cent.* 

This from the Eagle of March 18, 1910, makes us hope 
that something will be left for us next time: 

The comparative statement of payrolls prepared by Con- 
troller Prendergast was presented to the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment at the meeting to-day. The months 
compared were December, the last under the McClellan 
administration, and January and February, the first two 
months under the present administration. Mr. Prender- 
gast's figures go to show that the January payroll was 
$252,109.02 less than the December payroll, and the Febru- 
ary payroll compared to the last month of the previous ad- 
ministration shows a decrease of $552,409.62. 

As I said at the beginning of this chapter, we started 
cut with the determination that we would do nothing to 
reduce any salary fixed by the Davis Law, but the male 
teacher opposition to us has been so unfair and insulting 
that now we are prepared to insist that whatever money 
is allowed by the Board of Estimate and Apportionment 
for teachers' salaries shall be divided equitably, i.e., if the 
board of education has $1,500 for the hiring of two teach- 
ers for two positions exactly the same, it should divide it 

* One " Taxpayer," wrote to the Globe that if the White bill be- 
came law he expected to raise every one of his tenants from $3 
to $5 a month. As one correspondent answered : " A landlord 
like that doesn't need the passage of a ' White Bill ' to cause him 
to raise your rent. He would do it if he found a little fresh air 
coming into your apartment." Said correspondent proceeded to 
show how her landlord with property valued at $32,000 would have 
to pay $32 more if one mill tax were added, and that this would 
mean only 26! cents per month for each of the tenants. 



i82 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

into $750 and $750 instead of $600 and $900 ; and if it has 
$6000 for two principals of the same kind of school, it 
shall divide it into $3,000 and $3,000, instead of $3,500 and 
$2,500. 

Our McCarren-Conklin bills of 1907 and Gledhill-Foley 
bill showed we are ready to have the board establish a 
salary for a principalship of a boys' school, higher than 
that of the principalship of a mixed or a girls* school ; and 
for a mixed school, higher than that of a girls' school. 
Likewise, as to assistants to principals and other positions. 
Nor do we look for an obstacle in the Davis Law, because 
if Charter Revision does not soon eliminate the objection- 
able features of that law we are prepared to test its con- 
stitutionality in the courts. The following brief shows that 
steps have already been taken along this Hne. 



CHAPTER XV 

IS THE DAVIS LAW UNCONSTITUTIONAI? 

In the matter of the AppHcation of the Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers to the Board of Educa- 
tion for a Revision of the By-laws of the Department 
of Education relative to the salaries of men and women 
teachers. 



The obligation to equalize salaries in the schools is legal 
as well as moral. 

A legal as well as a moral obligation is upon the Board 
of Education to equalize the salaries of men and women in 
the School system of New York. Section 1091 of the char- 
ter under which these salaries have been fixed while osten- 
sibly a protective bit of legislation is in reality discrimina- 
tory and makes a distinction between the men and the 
women of the schools based solely upon sex in spite of the 
fact that it recites, that " salaries shall be regulated by 
merit, grade of class taught, length of service, experience 
in teaching, or by a combination of these considerations." 
There is nothing in this unctuous introduction to indicate 
it is about to declare that a man teacher after a certain 
number of years of service shall receive a salary of 100 per 
cent greater than a woman who does the same work. 

After reciting the considerations which shall regulate the 
salaries of the teaching force the law goes on to establish 
different minimum rates of compensation for men and 
women in the same positions, and the difference is based 
upon the fact of sex and nothing else. 

This is discriminatory legislation and it is in violation of 
the Constitution of the United States and of the Constitu- 
tion of the State of New York. There is no warrant for 

183 



i84 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

such discriminatory legislation and there is abundant reason 
for declaring it null and void. 

The 14th Amendment of the Federal Constitution is as 
follows : 

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, 
and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the 
United States and of the State wherein they reside. No 
state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge 
the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United 
States ; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, lib- 
erty or property, without due process of law, nor deny to 
any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the 
laws. 

If the section of the Charter of New York, under which 
the Board of Education has the authority to make by- 
laws reg'ulating salaries is protective in its character, it 
is evident that it does not give the men and the women 
of the school system the equal protection to which all 
persons, all citizens, are entitled under this amendment. 
If it is discriminatory, as the women teachers know it 
is, then it is in direct contravention of this declaration. 
Section 1091 of the charter is either protective or dis- 
criminatory. In either case it is a violation of the great- 
est of the Constitutional guarantees added to the organic 
law after the Civil War. 

The right to equality under the law is insured to the 
citizen by a triple guarantee. These are the fourteenth 
amendment of the Federal Constitution and Sections i and 
6 of Article i of the Constitution of the State of New 
York. The State guarantees are as follows: 

Section i, No member of this State shall be disfran- 
chised, or deprived of any of the rights or privileges 
secured to any citizen thereof, unless by the law of the 
land, or the judgment of his peers. 

Section 6. ... No person . . . shall be deprived 
of life, liberty or property without due process of law. 

As briefly as is consistent with the magnitude of the 
subject and the dignity of the cause we shall discuss these 
guarantees and their application to the subject of Equal 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 185 

Pay by taking them up in inverse order and ascertaining 
and quoting the judicial definitions necessary to demon- 
strate that the Charter provision regulating salaries is in 
direct violation of the Bill of Rights, (Article i, Section 6, 
Constitution State of New York) and the fundamental 
law of the nation as well. 

It is necessary then to know the meaning of the word 
liberty as set forth in the Bill of Rights, the interpreta- 
tion of the phrases " due process of law " and " Law of 
the Land " and the application of the declaration " Equal 
Protection of the Laws." 

In the People v. Marx (99 N. Y., 386), known as the 
Oleomargarine case, the Court of Appeals thus declared 
the broad application and the inviolability of the Constitu- 
tional guarantees : 

... The Constitution of the State provides (Art. i, 
Sec. i), that no member of this State shall be disfran- 
chised or deprived of any of the rights and privileges 
secured to any citizen thereof, unless by the law of the 
land, or the judgment of his peers. Section 6 of Article i 
provides that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty 
or property, without due process of law, and the Four- 
teenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States provides that " No State shall make or enforce any 
law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of 
citizens of the United States, nor shall any State deprive 
any person of life, liberty or property, without due proc- 
ess of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction 
the equal protection of the laws." These constitutional 
safeguards have been so thoroughly discussed in recent 
cases that it would be superfluous to do more than refer 
to the conclusions which have been reached, bearing upon 
the question now under consideration. Among these no 
proposition is now more firmly settled than that it is one 
of the fundamental rights and privileges of an American 
citizen to adopt and follow such lawful industrial pursuit 
not injurious to the community as he may see fit. 

(i Abb. U. S. 398; 16 Wall. 106; 4 Wash. C. C. 380; 
98 N. Y. 98.) The term "liberty," as protected by the 



i86 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Constitution, is not cramped into a mere freedom from 
physical restraint of the person of the citizen, as by in- 
carceration, but is deemed to embrace the right of man 
to be free in the enjoyment of the faculties with which 
he has been endowed by his creator, subject only to such 
restraints as are necessary for the common welfare. In the 
language of Andrew, J., in Bertholf v. O'Reilly (74 N. Y. 
515), the right to liberty, embraces the right of man "to 
exercise his faculties and to follow a lawful avocation for 
the support of life," and as expressed by Earl, J. in re 
Jacobs, " one may be deprived of his liberty, and his con- 
stitutional right thereto violated, without the actual re- 
straint of his person. Liberty in its broad sense, as under- 
stood in this country, means the right not only of freedom 
from servitude, imprisonment, or restraint, but the right 
of one to use his faculties in all lawful ways, to live and 
work when he will, to earn his livelihood in any lawful 
calling, and to pursue any lawful trade or avocation." 

A denial, therefore, of the equal protection of the law 
is an invasion of the liberty of the citizen. And when 
that denial is of such a character that it compels one citizen 
to sell product or service to the government for less than 
another, it amounts to a serious invasion of a fundamental 
right, which cannot be excused or explained by the asser- 
tion that there is freedom of choice as long as there is 
no actual physical conscription. The fallacy of this argu- 
ment is illustrated by supposing that the Metropolitan 
Street Railway Company were permitted to charge dif- 
ferent rates of fares. The citizen discriminated against 
would not be physically seized and compelled to ride, and 
would at all times have the right to walk, but he would, 
nevertheless, be the victim of an unequal and uncon- 
stitutional law. The argument that women have the right 
to refuse to teach at the present salaries is beside the 
question. They always had that right and they always 
will have it. In refusing to accept employment they have 
equal right with men. In preparing for their work as 
teachers they must have the same or equivalent qualift- 
cations as men. In this they are equal, too. What they 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL IVORK 187 

want now is equality of protection under the law, equality 
of opportunity; equality of pay. 

What constitutes the law of tJie land. 

It may be urged that what the Legislature has decreed 
is itself the " Law of the Land " or " Due Process of Law." 
And that, therefore. Section 1091 of the Charter and the 
inequitable by-laws of the Board of Education enacted 
thereunder are valid. Let us see then what these phrases 
mean. 

An early case in the judicial history of this State is 
that of Taylor v. Porter (4 Hill, 145), in which occurs 
this definition : 

" The words ' Law of the Land,' as here used, do not 
mean a statute passed for the purpose of working the 
wrong. That construction would render the restriction 
absolutely nugatory, and turn this part of the constitu- 
tion into mere nonsense." 

In People v. Toynbee (20 Barb., 169), it was held: 
. By " the law of the land " is meant a proceed- 
ing according to the course of the common law; a trial 
and judicial sentence, and not merely a statute passed for 
accomplishing the wrong. . . . The power of the Leg- 
islature in the enactment of laws (whatever it may be in 
other countries), is not unHmited in this; but is restricted 
both by the written constitution, and by the generally re- 
ceived principles of practice and right. 

II. 

Legislation dealing with persons similarly situated must 
treat them alike. 

It is not denied that the Legislature had the power to 
authorize the Board of Education to fix salary schedules as 
it saw fit, provided these schedules applied equally to every 
teacher eligible for a given position in the School De- 
partment. It had the power and the right to deal with 



i88 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the teachers as a class. It had the power to enact liberal 
or penurious laws as it saw fit. But after it set the 
teachers apart for special legislation it had neither the 
poiver nor the right to authorize a special classification 
within the general classification. A law relating to a class 
which affects members of that class unequally, whether as 
to privileges or penalties, is necessarily in violation of the 
guarantee that every citizen shall have the equal protection 
of the law. 

It is not claimed that any citizen, even a school teacher 
has a natural or inherent right to public employment, or 
that the city has not the right to refuse his services for 
reasons which may seem sufficient to the representatives of 
the Department of Education. But it is asserted that when 
the city sets up a standard of eligibility and declares all 
who have measured up to it successfully are fit and cap- 
able, it has not the right to make arbitrary distinctions 
between those whom it employs for the same work. If the 
teachers are worthy of their hire, it is because they have 
proved themselves qualified for the work and have done 
it acceptably. If a man teacher is worthy of his hire it 
is because he has done his work well and not because he 
is a man. A similar rule applies to the woman teacher. 
Merit, grade of class taught, length of service, experience 
in teaching, or a combination of these considerations should 
regulate compensation, as the Charter says they shall, 
though it does not follow these brave words. 

Ill 

Laws relating to persons similarly circumstanced which 
affect them unequally are a violation of the guarantee of 
civil rights. 

The Hon. Archibald R. Watson, Corporation Counsel of 
New York, and one of the most erudite law writers in this 
country, has discussed the subject of " Civil Riglits " in 
Vol. VI of the American and English Encyclopedia of 
Law, in an essay noteworthy for clear reasoning and well- 
considered conclusions. Here are three of them: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 189 

"Under the Fourteenth Amendment discriminating or 
partial legislation favoring or discriminating against par- 
ticular persons or classes, or particular persons of the same 
class, is prohibited.^ And, it has been said, equality of 
protection implies not only equal accessibility to the courts 
for the prevention or redress of wrongs and the enforce- 
ment of rights ; but equal exemption with others of the 
same class from charges or burdens of every kind* (p. 
78)." 

" Though a law be not discriminating in terms, yet if it 
is applied and administered by public authority so as prac- 
tically to make unjust discriminations between persons 
similarly circumstanced in law, in matters affecting their 
substantial rights, the law will be held invalid as being, in 
operation, such a denial of equal protection as is within the 
prohibition of the Constitution® (p. 79)." 

" It is immaterial, therefore, that legislation is general 
in terms, and that the persons at whom it is directed are 
not particularly designated. If the intent of the law was 
that it should affect a certain class with unequal harshness, 
which object is accomplished in its operation, the law con- 
travenes the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth 
Amendment, and is void.'^ " 

Let us see what the Supreme Court of the United States 
has said in upholdingi the principles set out by Mr. Watson, 
that whenever there is class legislation, every member of 
that class shall be treated alike. 

In Hayes v. Missouri (120 U. S., 68; 30 L. E., 578) it 
declared : 

" The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States does not prohibit legislation which is limited 
either in the objects to which it is directed or by the terri- 
tory within which it is to operate. It merely requires that 
all persons subjected to such legislation shall be treated 
alike, under all circumstances and conditions, both in the 
privileges conferred and in the liabilities imposed." 

And in Barbier v. Connolly (113 U. S,, 27; 28 L. E., 
923) it had already said: 

" Class legislation, discriminating against some and fav- 



190 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

oring others, is prohibited, but legislation which, in carry- 
ing out a public purpose, is limited in its application, if 
within the sphere of its operation it affects alike all per- 
sons similarly situated, is not within the amendment." 

Throughout these decisions, both of the Supreme Court 
of the United States and the Court of Appeals of this 
State, it is repeated over and over again that classifications 
are legal only when every person similarly circumstanced 
is treated alike. It will be observed that the words person 
and citizen are used, that no distinction is made because of 
sex. In the case of the Missouri Pacific Railroad v. Mac- 
key (127 U, S., 205; 32 L. Ed., 109) the Court repeated, 
Justice Field writing : 

" And when legislation applies to particular bodies or 
associations, imposing upon them additional liabilities, it 
is not open to the objection that it denies to them the equal 
protection of the laws, if all persons brought under its in- 
fluence are treated alike under the same conditions. 

" . . . Such legislation is not obnoxious to the last 
clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, if all persons sub- 
ject to it are treated alike under similar circumstances and 
conditions in respect both of the privileges conferred and 
the liabilities imposed." 

Coming down to a later day, Justice Brewer, in Cotting 
V. Goddard (183 U. S., 79), wrote for the same Court: 

" But while recognizing to the full extent the impossi- 
bility of an imposition of duties and obligations mathe- 
matically equal upon all, and also recognizing the right to 
classification of industries and occupations, we must never- 
theless always remember that the equal protection of the 
law is guaranteed, and that such equal protection is denied 
when upon one of ttvo parties engaged in the same kind of 
business and tmder the same conditions burdens are cast 
which are not cast upon the other." 

To the same purpose was the eloquent decision of Justice 
Brewer in Gulf, C. L. S." F. R. Co. v. Ellis (165 U. S., 150; 
41 L. Ed., 666). In this case the Court said: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 191 

" While as a general proposition this is undeniably true, 
yet it is equally true that such classification cannot be made 
arbitrarily. The State may not say that all white men shall 
be subjected to the payment of the attorneys' fees of par- 
ties successfully suing them, and all black men not. It may 
not say that all men beyond a certain age shall be alone 
thus subjected, or all men possessed of certain wealth. 
These are distinctions which do not furnish any proper 
basis for the attempted classification. That must always 
rest upon some difference which bears a reasonable and 
just relation to the act in respect to which the classification 
is proposed, and can never be made arbitrarily and without 
any such basis. . . . The first official action of this 
nation declares the foundation of government in the words : 
' We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are 
created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with 
certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, lib- 
erty and the pursuit of happiness.' While such declarations 
of principles may not have the force of organic law, or be 
made the basis of judicial decisions as to the limits of 
rights and duty, and while in all cases reference must be 
had to the organic law of the nation for such limits, yet 
the latter is but the body and the letter of which the former 
is the thought and the spirit, and it is always safe to read 
the letter of the Constitution in the Spirit of the Declara- 
tion of Independence. No duty rests more imperatively 
upon the courts than the enforcement of the Constitutional 
provisions intended to secure the equality of rights which 
is the foundation of free government. . . . " 



IV 

Arbitrary and fanciful classifications and discriminating 
legislation affecting persons of the same class unequally are 
condemned by the Courts. 

Numerous decisions in the Federal and the State Courts 
hold that legislation applying to well defined classes of per- 
sons is constitutional provided there is valid reason for the 



192 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

classification and everj^ one in a given class is equally sub- 
ject thereto. In legislating for the teachers of New York 
it was impossible to discriminate between men and women 
teachers in respect to salaries without producing an inequit- 
able and unequal situation. The Legislature enacted a law 
for the protection of the teachers of New York. This it 
had a right to do and its legislation would be beyond criti- 
cism on Constitutional grounds if it dealt equally with all 
teachers similarly situated, similarly circumstanced. The 
law knows no distinction of persons, and this salutary rule 
must be kept in mind. Section 1091 of the Charter and the 
By-Laws enacted under it show a sharp distinction between 
persons as such. They distinguish between teachers oc- 
cupying the same position in the matter of salary. They 
provide that a man occupying a given position shall have 
50 per cent, more than a woman at the beginning of service 
and that after a certain number of years he shall have 100 
per cent. more. This is a distinction between members of 
the same class not contemplated by the Constitution and 
not tolerated by the laws of New York in regard to any 
other public servants appointed under the merit system. 

Confusion is caused in considering this question by the 
fact that the Constitution of the State of New York and 
the Constitution of the United States, as interpreted by the 
courts permits classification, so long as the individuals in 
a given class are subjected to the same treatment. Of 
course this rule has sharp and well defined limitations. 
There can be no arbitrary or fanciful classifications. Legis- 
lation which applied solely to redhaired persons would not 
be Constitutional. Legislation providing dififerent schools 
for white and colored children would not be constitutional 
unless the schools were made just as good for the children 
of one race as for the children of the other. Women law- 
yers would upset a law providing that their costs in lawsuits 
should be 50 per cent, of the costs collected by men law- 
yers and they would do so under these clauses of the funda- 
mental law providing for equality of all citizens before the 
law. A law which should prescribe that women physicians 
should be paid half the fees paid men physicians would not 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 193 

be constitutional. And such a law would be upset even if 
it were couched in the specious and apparently protective 
phraseology of Section 1091 of the Charter. The Courts 
would hold it a limitation upon their earnings, and intended 
as such, no matter what the wording might be. 

When the Legislature passed the Law now forming Sec- 
tion 1091 of the Charter it was legislating on behalf of the 
teachers of New York as a class. The statute so far as it 
increased the salaries of the teaching force by providing 
minimum amounts that should be paid by the Board of 
Education was a distinct step in advance, but so far as it 
permitted discrimination against women teachers, it was a 
distinct retrogression, and the fact was pointed out by 
Governor Roosevelt who signed the bill. It was an espe- 
cially retrogressive measure so far as the teachers of Brook- 
lyn were concerned for they had equal pay before consoli- 
dation and this law took it away from them. 

A rule of equal treatment of pupils in the public schools 
was enunciated by the Court of Appeals in the case of Peo- 
ple et rel. Gallagher v. King (93 N. Y. 448), in which it 
was said: 

"The design of the common school system of this State 
is to instruct the citizen, and where, for this purpose, they 
have placed within his reach means of acquiring an educa- 
tion with other persons, they have discharged their duty 
to him and he has received all that he is entitled to ask of 
the government with respect to such privilege." 

This case arose from the establishment of separate schools 
for colored pupils in Brooklyn. It holds that the benefits 
of the public school system must be offered equally to all 
pupils. Is it conceivable that a rule of equality applying 
to the pupils may be legally denied to the teachers. The 
law declares that there must be practical equality of effi- 
ciency between schools in the same grade. If the inequality 
of salaries is excused by saying that men are better teachers 
than women, how can the equal efficiency of these schools 



194 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

be maintained when changes and transfers take place in the 
teaching force from time to time? 



V, 

Recent statutes and decisions in this state indicate that 
the Legislature and the Courts regard men and women as 
equal before the law. 

Significant legislation and significant decisions have been 
enacted and written in this State recently regarding the 
equality of men and women before the law. The Domestic 
Relations Law (Chapter 19, L. of 1909) makes the rights 
and the liabilities of husband and wife equal and re-enacts 
the law that a married woman and an unmarried woman 
shall have the same contractural business and property 
rights. The legislation of this State declares equality, of 
the civil rights of men and women generally. Section 1091 
of the Charter of New York is the only hit of legislation in 
which the principle of equality is ignored. 

In sustaining equality of the contractural rights of men 
and women, Justice Gray of the Court of Appeals writing 
for that tribunal in People v. Williams (189 N. Y. 131) 
in which a law preventing women from working in fac- 
tories at night was declared unconstitutional, made these 
sweeping declarations : 

" The fundamental law of the State, as embodied in its 
Constitution, provides that ' no person shall * * * be 
deprived of life, liberty or property without due process 
of law.' (Art. i. Sec. 6.) The provisions of the State 
and of the Federal Constitutions protect every citizen in 
the right to pursue any lawful employment in a lawful 
manner. He enjoys the utmost freedom to follow his 
chosen pursuit and any arbitrary distinction against, or 
deprivation of, that freedom by the legislature is an in- 
vasion of the constitutional guaranty. Under our laws men 
and women now stand alike in their constitutional rights 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 195 

and there is no warrant for making any discrimination be- 
tween them with respect to the liberty of person, or of con- 
tract. * * * It is clear, as it seems to me, that this 
legislation cannot, and should not, be upheld as a proper 
exercise of the police power. It is, certainly, discriminative 
against female citizens, in denying to them equal rights 
with men in the same pursuit. ^' * * 

"An adult female is not to be regarded as a ward of 
the state, or in any other light than the man is regarded, 
when the question relates to the business pursuit or calling. 
She is no more a ward of the state than is the man. She 
is entitled to enjoy, unmolested, her liberty of person, and 
her freedom to work for whom she pleases, where she 
pleases and as long as she pleases, within the general limits 
operative on all persons alike, * * * 

" So I think, in this case, that we should say, as an adult 
female is in no sense a ward of the state, that she is not 
to be made the special object of the exercise of the paternal 
power of the state and that the restriction here imposed 
upon her privilege to labor, violates the constitutional 
guarantees. In the gradual course of legislation upon the 
rights of a woman, in this state, she has come to possess all 
of the responsibilities of the man and she is entitled to he 
placed upon an equality of rights with the man." 

And this opinion had the concurrence of the entire court 
with the exception of Justice Cullen, who was absent. 

No extended argument is necessary to demonstrate where 
the Legislature stands in regard to this question of " Equal 
Pay." Its action at three successive sessions indicates how 
it now regards Section 1091 of the Charter and the By- 
Laws enacted thereunder. The Legislature is willing to 
right the wrong it sanctioned, and the highest Court of the 
State has indicated that it will favor neither special privi- 
leges nor special disabilities for women whatever their 
walk of life. The duty of the Board of Education is as 
apparent as its power is ample. 

The By-Laws of the Board of Education have in gen- 



196 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

eral used the minimum salaries prescribed by the Charter 
as the maximum salaries of the school system. The Board 
of Education, is not prevented by the Charter from making 
schedules that are just and equitable. It has abundant 
authority both in natural justice and the fixed Law of the 
Land. 

Charles F. Kingsley, 

Attorney-at-Law. 



CHAPTER XVI 

GLARING INEQUALITIES AND INCONSISTENCIES 

Principals of Elementary Schools 
Maximum ..Women . $2500 Men . $3500 

Grade Teachers 

Women — ist Year. . . .$ 600 Men — ist Year. . . .$ 900 

7th Year $840 " 7th Year $1633 

I2th Year $1080 " 12th Year $2160 

A man gets first year same as woman eighth year. 

Woman Teacher's Annual Increase, $40.00. Man's, 
$105.00. 

Secondary Schools 

Women. .$ 936.00 Men. .$1500.00 

Maximum " . .$1440.00 Maximum " . .$2400.00 

Graduating-Class Teachers 

(8th Grade) 

Women $84.00 Men $150.00 

High Schools 

Men Principals $5,000. No Women. 

1st. Assts. Maximum — Women. .$2500 Men. .$3000 

Assistants " " . .$1900 " . .$2400 

Junior Teachers " " . .$1000' " . .$1200 

District Superintendent — $5,000. 21 Men — 3 Women 

Woman Principal — 72 Classes — 3,200 Pupils — Salary $2500 
Man Principal — 12 Classes — 480 Pupils — Salary $3500 

197 



198 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The woman assistant to principal (she must have a special 
license) will receive in the eleventh year $1,600; a man 
teacher in school supervised by this assistant receives 
$2,400, or $2,160. That is, though not eligible to position 
held by the woman, he may receive fifty per cent, more 
salary. 

A man teaching in lowest schedule receives in his sixth 
year a salary higher than that paid a woman who is head of 
a department in her ninth year. 

A woman must be teaching boys and in her seventh year 
of experience before she receives the salary a man has 
from the very beginning. 

A man teaching a graduating class is receiving $650 
more than a woman principal of a school, say of yy classes, 
when both are in their eleventh year of service. Her maxi- 
mum finally is only $100 more than his. 

A woman principal never receives, no matter how large 
her school, no matter how excellent her record, as much 
as a man principal in his Urst year. 

We could cite case after case of a woman principal in 
charge of a school of from 40 to yy classes receiving $1,000 
a year less than a man principal in charge of a school of 
from 12 to 40 classes. 

Assistants to Principals or Heads of Departments, SB 

Grade 

Years of experience. Women. Men. 

9 $1,400 $2,100 

10 1,500 2,250 

II 1 ,600 2,400 

A woman may supervise a department in which there 
are men teaching grades receiving salaries 50 per cent, 
higher than hers. Yet (i) the man, not having Head of 
Department license, is not eligible to the position the woman 
holds; (2) a man in the lowest grade, holding lowest li- 
cense, is receiving in his sixth year $1,425 — a salary higher 
than that of a woman Head of Department in her ninth 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 199 

year of service. These women often have charge of 25 
classes, with the responsibilities of training the teachers, 
disciplining the pupils, making laborious reports, interview- 
ing parents, and so on. 

Men 
Years of Principals. in Grades Men in 

Experience. Women. Men. below 8B. Grade 8B. 

11 $1,750 $2,750 $1,950 $2,400 

12 2,000 3,000 2,055 2,400 

13 2,250 3,250 2,160 2,400 

14 2,500 3,500 2,160 2,400 

It will be seen that women, after serving the required 
ten years satisfactorily, passing the very difficult examina- 
tion for a principals' license, and securing a position as 
principal (usually after weary waiting), (i) receives in her 
first and second years as principal a lower salary than a 
man who may be in even the lowest grade (see schedule 
VI.) ; (2) serves three years as principal at a lower salary 
than a man in the 8B is receiving when the by-laws permit 
her to begin service as principal; (3) never receives, no 
matter what her experience, the salary a man receives in 
his £rst year as principal; (4) never receives a salary more 
than $100 in excess of that received by a man in the 8B 
grade having ten years' experience, and not having either 
the license for or the responsibility involved in her position. 

In a recent circular issued by the Association of Men 
Principals and Teachers, the statement is made that 
" Women teachers should note with interest that a ' com- 
plete, accurate and scientific statement of the increased cost 
of living ' proves that * every dollar you receive in salary 
now will buy not more than what 80c. would have bought 
in 1899.'" 

It has not been necessary for the women teachers to make 
any scientific inquiry to find out that at all times and at any 
time since 1899: 

(a) In her 13th year of service in grades below the 7A, 
the woman teacher has been receiving only 50 to 73^ cents 



200 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

for every dollar paid to the male teacher of same grade and 
experience ; 

{h) The woman assistant to principal has been receiving 
only 66f cents for every dollar paid the male assistant to 
principal ; 

(c) The woman principal has been receiving only from 
63 to 71 cents on every dollar paid the male principal ; 

{d) The woman teacher of a graduating class of boys 
has been receiying from 62 to 64 cents for every dollar paid 
td the male teacher of same grade and experience. 

Not long ago, acting in my capacity as District Superin- 
tendent of Schools, I examined Mr. B., who was nearing 
the end of his third year of teaching, and so had to be 
passed upon as to his fitness for a permanent license. I 
found his work generally unsatisfactory, and I could not 
recommend that his license be made permanent. Yet he 
was receiving fifty per cent, more salary than Miss B., who 
was appointed at the same time as he was and assigned to 
the same kind of class. In fact, Miss B. would have to 
teach eleven years to get as much as he was receiving. 
Furthermore, she would need to have passed the examina- 
tion for a permanent license at the end of her third year, 
and the examination as to fitness and merit at the end of her 
seventh year of service. 

Is not such a state of afifairs bad for Mr. B. as well as 
unjust to Miss B., and a disgrace to the community? 

Mayor McClellan, in his letter, read at our Carnegie 
Mass Meeting, said : 

" For the teaching of little children there can be no ques- 
tion but that women are far superior to men, and that 
they are therefore entitled to a higher rate of compensa- 
tion." 

In his Ninth Annual Report, Superintendent Maxwell 
said : " Experience has doubtless shown that women 
teachers teach younger pupils, boys as well as girls, better 
than men." 

Yet the men teaching these very " younger pupils " are 
paid from 50 to 100 per cent, more salary than the women 
who teach them " better." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 201 



Glaring Inconsistencies in the Attiiudes of Our Opponents 

The cry that the salaries of men teachers will be re- 
duced — yet. 

The cry that " Equal Pay " will cost nine to thirteen 
million dollars. 

The cry that " Equal Pay " will drive men out, and again 

The cry that " Equal Pay " will drive women out. 

The cry that the " Equal Pay " bills are mandatory — yet 

The cry for the retention of the Davis Law. 

The statement that women are superior to men as 
teachers of young children, yet 

The demand for the Davis Law which pays^iiTeiTtrom 50 
to 100 per cent, more than women in the/primary grades. 

The statement that men must be offered a higher salary 
than women in order to get "men of the proper calibre," 
yet 

The fact that hundreds of men now in the syfetem are the 
same men that were engaged in Brooklyn on " Equal Pay " 
salaries. Among them are the City Superintendent, three 
Associate Superintendents, six District Superintendents, 
four High School principals, and numerous elementary 
school principals. Now young men are appointed direct 
from City College. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE WHITE BILL OF I907 

It is painfully significant that the majority of the argu- 
ments advanced by the opponents of this bill, when they 
get down to the question of feasibility, are based upon a 
profound distrust of the Board of Education. It seems to 
be taken for granted that wherever the law leaves a loop- 
hole for the Board of Education to wiggle away from its 
mandate and do the wrong thing, prompt advantage will 
be taken thereof. The brief of the Men teachers and Prin- 
cipals amounts to a petition to the Legislature not to pass 
the White bill, because they will be turned over to the 
tender mercies of the Board of Education. The pleas put 
forward by Mr. Stern in behalf of the primary teachers 
is in effect a prophecy that they will fare badly at the 
hands of the Board of Education, because the Legislature 
has not specifically stated all that may be done for them. 
Mrs. Leveridge, who appeared before the Assembly Cities 
Committee in opposition to the bill, made an argument 
amounting to an attack upon the Board of Education, which 
she feared would discriminate against the primary teachers. 
Miss Davidson and Miss Reardon both evidenced such fear 
of the Board of Education that they are willing to continue 
working under the unjust and inadequate schedules of the 
Davis law rather than be left to the " discretion of the 
Board of Education," with a prospect of a share in the 
proceeds of the " extra mill." Miss Davidson was so ex- 
cited about this taking from her " the only safeguard and 
protection given me by a State Law " that she added 586 
to 565 and made a total of eleven thousand and fifty-one 
as the number of " primary teachers " opposed to the White 
bill. Incidentally I know that many of these protestants 
are men below the 7 A Grade. 

202 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 203 

In a statement made by the Senate Committee which re- 
ported this bill through Senator White, appears some com- 
ment upon the course of the Board of Education in not 
heeding the petition of the women teachers for justice. It 
is easy to see that these men accepted with some reluctance 
the conviction that the Board of Education had not done 
its duty in this matter and that they proceeded only after 
a careful examination of the situation. Bygones should 
be bygones. The slate has been wiped clean and the Board 
of Education is now free to go ahead and discharge the 
responsibility put upon it by this bill, sure of the loyal co- 
operation of those who have urged its enactment, sure that 
the only suspicion breathed against it comes from the men 
who are opposing the White bill. 

NO POLITICS IN THIS BILL 

There is no politics in this bill. An examination of the 
entire work of the Legislature would reveal no measure so 
free from politics as this one. Senators and Assemblymen 
without distinction of party supported it. They agreed 
that it was right in principle and they had no hesitation in 
saying that they were glad to support it when they learned 
positively, after consultation with the members from the 
counties composing Greater New York that it did not vio- 
late the principle of Home Rule. Certainly these members 
of the Legislature were justified in the conclusion that they 
were endorsing the principle of Home Rule when they 
realized that practically the entire legislative delegation 
from Greater New York favored the bill. And they were 
right. It is inconceivable that any bill violating the prin- 
ciple of Home Rule could have practically the unanimous 
support of the delegation from this city without regard to 
party, without stimulating some observant lawmaker to a 
political argument against it. There is no politics in this 
measure. There can be no politics in it. Legislation so 
just that it appeals to the sense of fairness of members of 
both parties so strongly that they refuse to entertain the 
thought of attempting to make political capital out of it, 



204 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

requires no defense against such a charge. It would be as 
sane to assert that the unanimous vote by which Congress 
declared war against Spain was tainted with politics. The 
passage of this bill by the Legislature marked one of those 
occasions in the life of the State when the lawmakers said, 
" It's just. It's right. Why have these women delayed so 
long in asking for justice? Let us do all that Ave can 
to right the wrong, without quibbling, without pettiness. 
Let us do our part to right the wrong." 

The same reasons which actuated the Legislature to pass 
this bill ought to secure its endorsement by the Mayor of 
New York. Better than any member of the Legislature 
is he acquainted with the fact that the women of the schools 
have been unfairly treated. More than any member of the 
Legislature is he responsible to these women who now 
appeal for justice. He is the first citizen of the community 
where the wrong has been tolerated ; and now under the 
Constitution and the laws it becomes his duty to pass upon 
their petition, a petition which the Legislature has stamped 
with its approval with practical unanimity. As Mayor of 
New York and a fellow-citizen of these women, he is more 
completely their representative than any member of the 
Legislature can be. They have asked the Legislature to 
clothe him with power to give them the justice they seek. 
The Legislature has done its part. An army of 13,000 
women, without one exception, believe that he will do 
his. 

The brief submitted by the President of the Interborough 
to Mayor McClellan urging his approval of the White bill, 
contained the following: 

" Those who approve the bill beg you, Mr. Mayor, to 
consider this bill not as you would original mandatory 
legislation over which you had no control ; and further- 
more, as an amendment which restores in large measure 
powers taken from the City seven years ago. Viewed in 
this light, there seems to be no ground left on which you 
would justify a veto, except that this bill establishes a 
principle which your Board of Education has disapproved — 
the principle of ' equalization.' 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 205 

" We beg you to believe that many members of said 
Board approve this principle, that public sentiment is over- 
whelmingly in favor of it, that all Civil Service standards 
demand it, and that we pray you to agree with us in the 
opinion that ' the position should command the salary ' irre- 
spective of color, size, weight, race, religion, politics, or 
sex of the person occupying same. 

" Further Reasons for Approval of Senate Bill 1218 : 

" It secures justice to 13,000 of the citizens of the great 
city — to 13,000 of the city's most necessary, valuable and 
worthy employees. 

" It gives a far greater measure of Home Rule than does 
Sec. 1091 of Charter it amends. 

" The great majority of the best citizens of the city re- 
quest it — ^witness : 

" Over 100,000 names on petitions representing hundreds 
of millions of taxable property. 

" Over 5,000 telegrams sent you by citizens requesting its 
approval. 

" Over 5,000 individual requests of Primary Teachers for 
Approval of bill. 

" State Representatives approve it : 

"Witness: 21 Senators, i against; 6^ Assemblymen, 3 
against. 

" City representatives approve it : witness unanimous 
resolutions of Board of Aldermen. 

"Over 5,000 petitions of Primary Teachers as against 
the few who seek to defeat the bill." 

Some of the men employed in the School Department 
banded themselves together to oppose this measure. From 
them and from them alone have emanated several state- 
ments purporting to give reasons against this measure. Let 
us examine these " reasons." 

1. Women always have earned less than men. 

2. It would belittle the men to earn the same salaries as 
the women. 

3. Men would not get ahead in the school system. 



2o6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

4. Men are better teachers than women. 

5. Men have families to support. 

6. Men have a contract which this law would break. 
The first reason is a recapitulation of the old argument 

used by the defenders of every hoary wrong. It amounts 
to saying that a custom is good and should be perpetuated 
because it is old. Slavery, polygamy and brigandage relied 
for ages upon this argument. 

To the second declaration that it would belittle the men 
to receive the same salaries as women, it is enough to 
answer that it is infinitely more belittling for them to sup- 
port an unjust system whereby women are paid only one- 
half as much as men for doing the same work with equal 
faithfulness, fidelity and success. 

Another link in their chain of argument is that men 
v.'ould not get ahead in the school system as fast as they 
do now. They may be right in this conclusion, if the)'' 
mean that favoritism and discrimination in their favor be- 
cause they are men would no longer be factors in promo- 
tion. But if they mean that hard work, attention to duty, 
competency, satisfactory results, are not to receive recogni- 
tion, they are profoundly mistaken. These elements of 
service will be the factors in determining promotion in the 
future. The merit system will obtain instantaneous recog- 
nition in the School Department as never before in its his- 
tory, and ambitious, progressive men will have a better 
chance and a wider range of opportunity than ever before. 

Men are better teachers than women, they say. This is 
the fourth reason. If that is so, men will soon dominate 
in the school system of New York, for salaries will be as 
attractive for all in a given grade or schedule as they are 
now for a chosen few in that grade or schedule, a chosen 
few whose claim to special financial recognition by the city 
is the fact that they are men. That argument answers it- 
self. Of course there is a further fact that those of us 
who have attended school and who have had an opportunity 
to judge, do not come to the same conclusion as to the rela- 
tive ability of men and v*^omen teachers as do these sapient 
gentlemen. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 207 

But what can we say in response to the statement that 
men have families to support? Granting this as an argu- 
ment, it must be acknowledged that it costs a woman just 
as much to support a family as it costs a man. They know 
that while she may be compelled to accept a salary fifty 
per cent, less than his salary she is not given a correspond- 
ing reduction in anything she buys. They know that she 
must pay as much for clothing and board and car fare 
and theater tickets and medical attendance and shoes and 
the other necessaries of life as they. She must endure the 
humiliation of accepting fifty cents on the dollar when 
drawing her wages, but she finds no corresponding reduc- 
tion in the price of anything she buys through all the wide 
range of possible purchases. Is it not true that in thou- 
sands of cases, right here in the school system of New 
York, women are supporting families or aiding brothers 
and sisters to obtain an education and to embark in a pro- 
fession? This is true in even a larger degree than might 
be supposed at first thought. The old order changes. Years 
ago the son was the reliance and the mainstay of aged 
parents. He devoted himself to the old folks and stayed 
at home and remained single in order to provide for them. 
Now the burden is frequently shifted to the daughter. The 
son marries and has a family of his own,, while the daugh- 
ter remains at home and cares for her parents. This is a 
phase of social conditions in New York city to-day which 
represents a changing sense of family loyalty and duty. It 
is not easy to explain ; but it exists, nevertheless. 

What about the implied contract the men say in their 
sixth objection to this bill they have with the city? They 
have no contract either expressed or implied which depends 
for its validity upon denying their women associates in the 
School Department the right to equal pay for equal work. 
There is no law, no contract, no bond guaranteeing to them 
the right to advance at the expense of their fellow teachers 
of the female sex. But the women teachers have a guar- 
antee by virtue of their citizenship, both from State and 
nation, that they shall have equal treatment before the law 
with all other citizens and that no disability shall be at- 



2o8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

tached to them by reason of race or creed or sex. And 
this bond is paramount and perpetual. 

The Association of Men Teachers and Principals evi- 
dently believe in the present Charter provision called the 
Davis law because it does not observe the principle of 
Home Rule with such breadth and sweep as does the White 
bill. In their circular entitled "Why Senate Bill No. 1162 
cannot accomplish its purpose," they say : " The Davis law 
lacks the broad generalization of the White bill. . . . 
If it is wise to regulate the salaries of policemen and other 
city officials by statute, there would seem to be no well- 
founded reason against the retention of similar legislation 
in the case of schools. To substitute for fixed, definite 
salaries, guaranteed by the State, a fluctuating system, 
changing from year to year, sensitive to financial depres- 
sion, and responsive to the caprice and whim of municipal 
political fortune, would seem a long step backward. It is 
earnestly hoped that very careful consideration will be 
given before so revolutionary a bill is made a law." 

The Men Teachers and Principals, it is apparent, are 
opposed to the White bill, not because it violates the prin- 
ciple of Home Rule, but because it refers the whole ques- 
tion of salaries, subject to a few general principles, back 
to the Board of Education, thus recognizing Home Rule. 
They are opposed to the bill which they call " revolution- 
ary " because it recognizes the principle of Home Rule and 
gives back to the Board of Education certain broad and 
sweeping powers which the Davis law took away. The 
Legislature in passing this act was so careful to confer full 
authority upon the Board of Education under the general 
declaration of equality, a sentiment in no sense local or 
limited, that the Men Teachers and Principals opposed the 
bill. They cried out against it because full authority under 
the declaration of equality is bestowed upon the Board of 
Education, an authority which the male opponents of the 
measure denominate the " caprice and whim of municipal 
political fortune." The Legislature has passed an act con- 
taining a declaration of a principle as broad as humanity 
and as enduring as justice ; under which it restores to the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 209 

Board of Education the power of which it was deprived 
seven years ago. At the same time it has furnished ample 
funds to readjust the salary schedules on an equitable basis. 

The Board of Education, through its apparently author- 
ized spokesman, Mr. Abraham Stern, absolutely refused to 
consider any request involving " equalization." This was 
the only ground on which our organization could, under 
its Constitution, stand. 

Furthermore, the Interborough realized that no officer or 
body of officers of the City government could eliminate the 
words "male" and "female" from Section 1091 of the 
City Charter. 

Thus was the appeal to " Albany " justified. 

Mr. Abraham Stern's Objections : " Bill is a viola- 
tion of ' Home Rule.' " We grant that the bill is manda- 
tory in some of its provisions ; but it is evident to every 
fair-minded student of this bill that it gives to the Board 
of Education a far greater measure of " Home Rule " than 
does Sec. 1091 of the Charter which it seeks to amend. 

Mr. Stern is right in saying it compels the raising of the 
lowest salary $600 to $720, and the reduction of a 16-year 
term to 12 years. For seven years the Board has failed to 
see the unfairness in the present conditions. Our State 
representaives were amazed to find our teachers so meanly 
paid. 

Mr. Stern's arguments and Mr. Maxwell's letter both 
showed a failure to grasp the true situation. There is 
nothing in the " White " bill which would make it neces- 
sary to transfer " all men (519) in grades from 2 B to 
6B" (Mr. Maxwell's letter) into grades above the 6B 
between now and January i, 1908, for the purpose of avoid- 
ing the necessity of paying all teachers of boys' classes be- 
low the seventh year salaries according to $900 . . . 2160 
schedule. That schedule is secured to men below the 7th 
year grades only by a by-law of the Board of Education, 
and therefore it can be amended at any meeting of said 
Board. Suppose, then, that the " McCarren schedules " 
were adopted by the Board. No men would need to find 
places in " the grades of the last two years " (Davis law) 



210 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

in order to secure continuance of $105 increment to $2,160 
except those who had completed eight years in the Jower 
grades. This number at present is 53, that is 466 less 
than the 519 mentioned in Mr. Maxwell's letter. It will 
thus be seen that even those who believe that men are 
needed below the 7 A grade need have no fear. 

Mr. Stern said where there are men in the grades the 
" schedules must be different " from the schedules of grades 
where there are no men. This does not appear in the 
" White " bill. There is nothing in the " White " bill to 
prevent the Board of Education from making uniform 
schedule\s for all grades below 7 A. Then, where is there 
ground for all the wild and unfounded fears of " the pri- 
mary teachers " and their recently discovered friends ? 
Surely not in the " White " bill ; but rather in the distrust 
of the Board of Education. 

Mr. Stern contrasted the salary of a teacher in the 4 A 
and that of a teacher in the 4B, intimating that the latter 
would receive 50 per cent, more than the former, and 
claimed that here was " the most pernicious and vicious 
feature of this bill." This arbitrary division between the 
4 B and the 4 A is absolutely unjustifiable by any pro- 
vision of the " White " bill. 

We are surprised to have Mr. Stern compare the teach- 
ers with the employees of the business world. The teacher's 
is a Civil Service appointment. She is taken out of the 
conditions which prevail in the open market, and after hav- 
ing complied with all the requirements, and having passed a 
competitive examination, she is placed on an eligible list ; 
then she must await appointment in order of standing. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

THE WHITE BILL — 1908 

The White bill of 1908 was practically the same as that 
of 1907, which had passed both houses of the Legislature 
twice; but it had been carefully redrawn by Horace E. 
Deming, who had represented us at the Governor's hear- 
ing in 1907, and who was familiar with the objections which 
had been made against it. 

Two of the reasons given by Mayor McClellan for his 
veto, namely, that the principle of Home Rule was vio- 
lated, and that the bill was mandatory, had been rendered 
null and void in the following words by Governor Hughes 
in his veto message on the bill : 

" Apart from the power of the Mayor to appoint and re- 
move as stated, and the duty of the city to supply the funds 
as required, the Board of Education exercises its powers 
independently. It is not subject to control by the city au- 
thorities. There is no contract or official relations between 
the teachers and the city." 

" The Board of Education has the management and con- 
trol of the public schools and of the public school system 
of the city, subject only to the general statutes of the State 
relating to public schools and public school instruction and 
to the provisions of the charter." 

The Mayor's third reason, the expense, we held to be 
entirely covered by the provision of our bill which in- 
creased the three-mill tax to four mills, and we believed 
that unless a majority of the taxpayers of the city objected 
no one else should. 

The Governor in his veto message had said: 

"The Board of Education is thus directly subject to the 
control of the Legislature, and whatever provisions may be 
found necessary or wise for the purpose of defining its 
powers or prescribing its policy must be prescribed by the 



212 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Legislature. No other authority is competent to make such 
provision." The Governor also said, " But while the Leg- 
islature has power to deal with every phase of the matter, 
the course which experience approves is that certain gen- 
eral principles of action should be laid down, and that 
within these principles, freedom with reference to details 
of management should be left to the subordinate body act- 
ing with peculiar knowledege of local conditions." 

We were asking the Legislature to lay down the general 
principle, " There shall be no discrimination in salary on 
account of the sex of the incumbent of a position." This 
principle had prevailed in Brooklyn until the Legislature, 
by passing the " Davis Bill " in 1900, instituted the sched- 
ules which we were seeking to amend. The " Davis Bill " 
had put upon thousands of the best citizens of the city a 
degrading discrimination. The Legislature of 1907 becom- 
ing aware of this injustice twice had voted to remove it. 

Some have said, " Your Board of Education has power to 
amend these schedules as you desire." This is true. But 
after repeated appeals, our Board of Education has failed 
so to amend them. Governor Hughes, in his veto message 
of our bill, states " under the by-laws adopted by the board 
(referring to the Board of Education) glaring inequalities 
now exist." Again Governor Hughes, in the same message, 
says, " It is proposed by legislative enactment to establish 
the proposition that for work of a given position women 
shall receive equal pay with men. It is for this principle 
the supporters of the bill contend, and not for mere in- 
creased pay. The gross inequalities which have been per- 
mitted by the Board of Education, and which clearly should 
not be continued, are pointed out for the purpose of em- 
phasizing the principle in question." 

Impelled probably by these opinions so clearly expressed 
by the Governor, our Board of Education had prepared 
salary schedules which reduced to some extent the " glar- 
ing inequalities," and which called for an additional appro- 
priation of about $3,000,000. But the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment refused to allow money for this pro- 
posed increase. All this in the face of the undeniable fact 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 213 

that upward of 20,000 of the city's children, and therefore 
of the children who, under the constitution of the State, 
must be given an education, are without regular teachers. 

But we found a special reason for appealing to Albany 
again in the last sentence of Governor Hughes' message, 
which ran as follows : " The matter should be left to the 
Board of Education to be dealt with locally, as it may seem 
best, unless the Legislature is prepared to lay down the 
general principle for the entire State and the entire public 
service." 

We believed that the Legislature, in again passing our 
bill, would give proof that it was " prepared to lay down 
the general principle for the entire State and the entire 
public service." But as New York City is the only city 
in which the State has fixed salaries for teachers, and our 
appeal was therefore for an amendment to the Charter of 
the City of New York, we did not feel justified in making 
our bill a State bill. Furthermore, the State, in its appro- 
priation act, does provide salaries for positions regardless 
of the sex of the incumbent. 

Our bill was passed by the Senate with more than a two- 
thirds vote, the longest speech against it being made by 
Senator Travis of Kings, who insisted that he beheved in 
*' Equal Pay," praised women teachers, spoke of the unem- 
ployed and the cost of the bill. The eight Senators who 
voted against us were all so-called " Hughes' Senators." 

When the bill reached the Assembly it became evident 
that it was of sufficient importance to be considered in 
connection with the approaching gubernatorial and presi- 
dential election. 

The following letter, written while the bill was being held 
in the Cities Committee, is offered in evidence. I submit 
it without names at the request of the recipient: 

" Albany, N. Y., March 12, 1908. 

" I have your letter of the loth inst. and wish to say that 

I do not believe that you mean to refer to me when you 

speak of a ' hold up.' I have never been accused of such 

action on legislation nor do I believe that the other mem- 



214 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

bers of the committee of the Affairs of Cities who have 
taken the same action as I, do so from any such mo- 
tives. If there were no other reason for my opposing the 
bill I would do so for the protection of Governor Hughes, 

" I helped to give the teachers an opportunity to present 
their cause to him last year. He has stated his opinion 
which he has not yet changed. I consider their efforts this 
year one intended to put him in as bad a position as pos- 
sible. Because of the politicians who are behind this mat- 
ter, I consider that it has developed into a political game 
of the meanest kind. 

" I trust that you will consider the above remarks not as 
directed against the women school teachers, whom I con- 
sider a very deserving class and whom I would like to aid, 
but rather at the methods being used to further the polit- 
ical designs of certain politicians. 

" With kindest regards, I am, 

"Very truly yours, 

"(Signed) ." 

In the issue of March 30, 1908, a New York morning 
paper printed the following from its correspondent in Al- 
bany : " Speaker Wadsworth accorded the school teachers 
an hour's interview, and the bill in all its phases was dis- 
cussed in his private room. Politics now figure in the 
passage of the bill. It is said that Governor Hughes does 
not want the bill to be put up to him a second time. His 
friends say that a veto of it on the eve of a Presidential 
election might be injurious to him. For that reason the 
' Hughes Senators ' voted against it. The Hughes men on 
the Rules Committee are taking this view of the political 
end of the bill and it is still hanging fire there." 

The inference to be drawn from the above is scarcely 
complimentary to the Executive of a great Commonwealth 
where 12,000 of its law-abiding citizens — without the 
franchise — are trying to have a recognized injustice cor- 
rected by the body that enacted it. 

While the bill was pending in the Rules Committee, we 
made the following appeal: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 215 

" In the name of the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers, consisting of over 12,000 of the women in the 
Supervising and Teaching force of the pubHc school sys- 
tem in the City of New York, I do pray you to report out 
Senate Cities Committee Bill 686, familiarly known as the 
* Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bill.' I base my petition on 
the following: 

" I, Because the Bill is a Senate Cities Committee Bill ; 

" 2. Because the Bill passed the Senate by more than a 
two-thirds vote; 

"3. Because the Bill is similar to, but an improvement 
on the Senate Cities Committee Bill 1218 of the last ses- 
sion, which passed the Assembly first by a vote of 105 to 
15, and second, after Mayor McClellan's veto, by a vote of 
82 to 55 ; 

"4. Because the Board of Aldermen representing the 
people of the City of New York, has unanimously endorsed 
the measure; 

" 5. Because the Bill is endorsed by nearly 300 civic, 
religious, political, social, business and labor organizations 
in the City of New York, and throughout the entire State, 
representing hundreds of thousands of voters and many 
millions of capital ; 

" 6. Because thousands of individual citizens and tax- 
payers, fully cognizant of the meaning and cost of this par- 
ticular piece of legislation, have added their endorsement 
to our petition; 

" 7. Because at two very enthusiastic Mass Meetings, 
resolutions praying the Legislature to pass this Bill were 
unanimously adopted. At the Cooper Union Meeting, the 
resolution was moved by Rev. Henry A. Mottet, Pastor of 
the Church of the Holy Communion, New York; and at 
the Brooklyn meeting, by Rev. Lynn P. Armstrong, Rector 
of the Cuyler Presbyterian Church ; 

"8. Because the Legislature owes this measure of relief 
and justice to the women teachers of the City of New York, 
since it was by an act of the Legislature in 1900 that the 
unusual and unjust discrimination against women on ac- 
count of sex was fixed by statute; 



2i6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" g. Because the passage of this bill will purge the stat- 
utes of the Empire State of the only law which discrimi- 
nates against woman in the labor market simply on account 
of her sex ; 

" 10. Because all the evidence tends to show that if the 
relief sought by the women teachers could be granted di- 
rectly by the voters of the City of New York, the women 
would be immediately successful ; 

" II. Because if we are to go down to defeat in the 
Assembly, we would like our friends in said body to have 
an opportunity of showing their loyalty to our cause. 

" 12. Because it is right. 

" Do not kill us like rats in a trap. Give us a chance, 
at least, in the open field." 

In addition to this, a petition begun by Assemblyman 
Conklin — the " father " of the Assembly bill — and circu- 
lated among the members of that body, was signed by 104 
of the 105 members not on the Rules Committee. But the 
committee did not report the bill. This seemed so con- 
trary to the true spirit of a democratic government that 
I was not surprised to hear Mary Chalmers — one of our 
most conservative members — say : " Now I know how 
anarchists are made." 



CHAPTER XIX 

CONCrLIATION COMMITTEE AND SIX-AND~SIX PLAN 

In the fall of 1908, a committee of men and women, 
which came to be known as the Conciliation Committee, 
Avas organized, with Henry N. Tifft, a former president of 
the Board of Education, as chairman, and Charles Dewey, 
president of the Male Principals' Association, as secretary. 
The other members were : 

Katharine D. Blake, principal elementary school ; 

Katharine A. McCann, principal elementary school ; 

Annie B. Moriarty, principal elementary school and vice- 
president Interborough Association of Women Teachers; 

Kate Turner, first assistant, high school ; 

Grace C. Strachan, district superintendent of schools and 
president of Interborough Association of Women Teachers ; 

Mary Moore Orr, Local School Board ; 

Miriam Sutro Price, president Public Education Society; 

J. Edward Swanstrom, author of the " Swanstrom Six- 
and-Six Plan," ex-president Borough of Brooklyn, ex-pres- 
ident Board of Education ; 

Walter B. Gunnison, principal high school ; 

Magnus Gross, teacher of 8 B and president of New York 
City Teachers' Association; 

James J. Sheppard, principal high school and president 
Interborough Council, and, 

Frank L. Perkins, principal elementary school and presi- 
dent Brooklyn Teachers' Association. 

Before the work of this committee was completed, Mr. 
Gross and Mr. Sheppard resigned. The final report con- 
tained a schedule of salaries in which there was no dififer- 
ence in salary based on the sex of the teacher. The report 
was adopted by representatives from a majority of all the 
teachers' associations in the city by a vote of 15 to 7. 

This meeting of the presidents of the Board of Educa- 

217 



2i8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

tioii and the various associations of teachers and principals 
of this city was held in the Board Rooms, Hall of Educa- 
tion, at 8 p. M., on Thursday, April i, 1909. 

Hon. Egerton L. Winthrop, Jr., president of the Board 
of Education, was asked to preside, and Mr. Charles O. 
Dewey, president of the Principals' (Male) Association of 
the City of New York, was elected secretary. 

Among those present were Egerton L. Winthrop, 
president of the Board of Education ; Commissioners 
A, Stern, Barrett, Kanzler, Haupt, and Katzenberg; 
President Grace C. Strachan of the Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers, President J. J. Sheppard 
of the Interborough Council, President Mary Curtis, 
Association of Women Principals of New York City; 
President W. A. Boylan of the Principals' Club, Pres- 
ident Charles O. Dewey of City Principals' Association, 
President Magnus Gross of the New York City Teachers' 
Association, President F. K. Perkins of the Brooklyn 
Teachers' Association, President E. S. Shumway of the 
Male High School Teachers' Association, President J. S. 
Tildsley of the High School Teachers' Association, Prin- 
cipal Fanny S. Comings of the Brooklyn Heads of Depart- 
ments, President Mary Lilly, New York Heads of Depart- 
ments ; President Fred Paine of the Association of Male 
First Assistant Teachers in High Schools, President Edgar 
Vanderbilt of the Male Principals' Association of Manhat- 
tan and the Bronx, Henry Moore of the Male Teachers of 
Brooklyn and Queens. President Alice Gray of the Brook- 
lyn Class Teachers' Association, President Lina E. Gano 
of the Women's High School Teachers' Association, Miss 
Katherine D. Blake, W. B. Gunnison, Miss Kate E. Turner, 
President Van Evrie Kilpatrick of the School Garden As- 
sociation, S. C. Walmsley, R. Richardson, M. D. Quinn, 
Mrs. A. B. Moriarty, Miss Clara C. Calkins, representing 
the Women Principals' Association of Brooklyn. 

Among the most interesting statements made in the dis- 
cussion preceding the vote on these " Conciliation Sched- 
ules," were the following: Miss Alice Gray, president of 
the Class Teachers' Association, approved " particularly 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 219 

the clause relative to class teachers' salaries, and more par- 
ticularly those additional salaries given to teachers of boys' 
and of mixed classes in the lower grades, increasing from 
the first and second years to the third and fourth and then 
again to the fifth and sixth " ; and Mr. Edgar S. Shumway, 
president of the Male Teachers' Association, said, " I am 
free to say that if the money were under my control, I 
would see to it that the woman who is first assistant in 
high school, as I am, received as much money as I re- 
ceived." 

The committee was unanimous in its opinion that a kin- 
dergarten class could not be a true kindergarten class un- 
less it consisted of both boys and girls, and therefore that 
the teacher of such a class should receive no bonus. The 
statement that the elasticity of schedules is endangered by 
the new law is also misleading. 

The schedule is uniform for all teachers in the grades of 
the first six years, except for the variance in bonuses for 
mixed and boys' classes. The Conciliation Committee was 
also unanimous in its opinion that the best interest of the 
children of the city would be conserved by having all classes 
in the first six years mixed classes, and therefore the bo- 
nuses were so planned, as to make it cheaper for the Board 
of Education to make two classes mixed classes, rather 
than one a girls' class and the other a boys' class. For in- 
stance : in the group where the bonus for the mixed classes 
is $60 the bonus for a boys' class is $132. Therefore, the 
Board would save $12 on every two classes that it organ- 
ized as mixed classes, rather than as one a girls' class and 
the other a boys' class. 

This plan also makes it possible for the Board to ofifer 
some special inducement to men teachers, as the salary for 
a boys' class, even in grades of the first six years, is from 
$60 to $180 higher than the salary for a girls' class. All 
who are familiar with the workings of the system of the 
public education in this city, know that it is much more 
difficult to get teachers for mixed and for boys' classes 
than it is for girls' classes, and in this particular the com- 
mittee believed that the law of supply and demand was 



220 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

properly recognized in offering a larger salary for the 
teacher of boys. 

In the grades of the seventh and eighth years, the de- 
partmental system is now quite generally used, and it often 
happens that a teacher assigned to a grade of the 7 A girls 
in charge of the mathematics, spends half her time teach- 
ing boys of various grades, including, frequently, boys of 
the graduating classes. We believe that it is manifestly un- 
fair then to pay such a teacher only the salary of a 7 A 
girls' class. We believe that this work should be treated 
practically the same as that in high schools, where a teacher 
is in charge of a special subject. In high schools there is 
but one salary, and therefore in the new schedules but one 
salary is provided for teachers of the grades of the seventh 
and eighth years, excepting that there is the bonus for 
teachers in mixed and in boys' schools. Again, this is to 
meet the contention that in order to get teachers of boys, a 
higher salary should be offered. 

The statement that the new bill adds a year to the ele- 
mentary school course is also wrong. At present there is 
an eight-year elementary school course and a four-year 
high school course. The committee was in favor of divid- 
ing those twelve years according to the Six-and-Six plan, 
or rather Six-and-Three-and-Three plan. This subdivision 
has been approved by the City Club, by the State Depart- 
ment of Education, by the Department of Education in 
France and Japan, as well as in ten of the large cities in 
this country. 

The report of the Conciliation Committee includes prac- 
tically all of the " Swanstrom " and " City Club " Six-and- 
Six plan. I regret that lack of space prohibits my includ- 
ing all the opinions of prominent educators that have been 
expressed on this plan. All reports agree that there is 
something wrong with our present Course of Study, par- 
ticularly in what it does for the majority boy or girl that 
leaves school at fourteen — the compulsory school age in 
this State. Personally, I feel very strongly on this point; 
and were there no other element of great value in the Six- 
and-Six plan, I would favor it because its adoption would 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 221 

force a revision of the Course of Study that would benefit 
this majority boy and girl. 

Briefly, the Six-and-Six plan provides that the twelve 
years now divided into an eight-year elementary course and 
a four-year high school course be divided into a six-year 
elementary and a six-year high school course ; and that this 
latter be subdivided into a three-year " junior " or " sub " 
high school course to be taught in one or more buildings 
in each school district, and a three-year full high school 
course preparing for college., professional, or advanced vo- 
cational work ; that the first two years of the junior high 
school have elective trade courses, the third to be a double 
course, one part consisting of subjects now taught in the 
first year of the present high school and the other of trade 
classes — an arrangement permitting the pupil intending to 
leave school at the end of the junior high school to take, if 
he chooses, a full trade course. 

In an address before the International Congress of Arts 
and Sciences at St. Louis, September 23, 1904, City Super- 
intendent Maxwell advocated practically the identical plan 
now " proposed " by the City Club. In the course of that 
address Dr. Maxwell said : " School life above the kinder- 
garten age should be divided into two equal periods. . . . 
Each period would provide for six years of school work — 
the elementary from six to twelve ; the secondary from thir- 
teen to eighteen." 

The National Educational Association has had a com- 
mittee working on this problem for several years, and in 
its report for 1908 says: 

" It is well to note that within the present year, J. Ed- 
ward Swanstrom, for some time president of the Board of 
Education in Brooklyn, and later a member and president 
of the Board of Education of Greater New York, pubHshed 
in the Brooklyn Eagle an argument for the adoption of the 
six-year course of elementary study, to be followed by three 
years of work in the lower high schools plus three years 
in the upper high grade or specialized high schools. In 
that article Mr. Swanstrom argues forcibly that his plan 
would not only increase the educational efficiency of the 



±22 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

schools, but would be highly economical for the City of 
Greater New York. 

" At least ten cities in the United States, for several 
years, have employed the proposed six-year division and 
believe it to be more economical." 

The following evidence dissatisfaction with our present 
courses : 

Schools have been mapping their courses to prepare pu- 
pils for the professions in spite of the fact that only lo 
per cent, ever take up such work. Over 90 per cent, of 
the population enter industries and the schools provide 
little or no training. This education of the few to the 
neglect of that of the many was the theme of an address 
by Arthur Dean, chief of the Division of Trade Schools of 
the State Department of Education, Albany, at the Wash- 
ington Irving High School yesterday. He made a plea for 
revision of the course. In part he said : 

" Do you girls know what per cent, of our population 
is engaged in industrial occupations? Ninety per cent. 
Do you know what per cent, is engaged in the so-called 
learned professions — teaching, preaching, doctoring, etc.? 
Ten per cent. What is now beginning to seem strange and 
unfair to the American citizens is that the education of- 
fered to boys and girls of from thirteen years of age up- 
ward has been conducted entirely for the 10 per cent. The 
movement into which America is now entering is to adjust 
secondary education to the lives of all, not a part of its 
people. Culture must and will exert its influence upon 
American life, but if anyone asserts that culture is to be 
obtained only or even especially in the high school courses 
now in vogue, he is no longer to be believed. There is no 
culture superior to that which comes from doing things 
which one can see the use of." 

REORGANIZE THE SCHOOLS 

" I would give no less attention to graduating lawyers 
and physicians, but would give a great deal more to turn- 
ing out of our public schools young men with a good, 




Hon. Alfred E. Smith, 

Strongest and Hardest Fighter for the "Equal Pay" Bills 
IN THE Assembly Cities' Committee, the Charter Legisla- 
tive Committee and on the Floor of the Assembly. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 223 

common school education plus a year's practical training 
at some useful trade. I would have a first-class manual 
training school attached to every high school and to every 
college and university, where young men could be turned 
out good, practical journeymen, blacksmiths, boilermakers, 
carpenters, cabinet workers, plumbers or skilled workmen 
at some other useful trade. I would increase the capacity 
of these schools to accommodate every child in the com- 
mimity and then I would make attendance compulsory. 

" If we adopt Germany's system of technical training, 
her research and thoroughness, and combine them with our 
inventions, the combination would dominate the world. 
Without these fundamental qualities, it is only a question of 
time when this country must surrender its place as a leader 
among the great manufacturing nations of the world." — 
President W. C. Brown of the New York Central. 

Standard-Union, March 16, 1909: 

" A NEW PLAN FOR THE SCHOOLS 

" Of the various plans for settling the dififerences be- 
tween the men and women teachers on the question of pay, 
a proposal which may go into the administrative code of 
the charter offers the best prospect of bringing about agree- 
ment. It divides the twelve years of school work into two 
periods of six years each and provides that all teachers in 
the lower six years shall be women. In the upper six years 
all teachers shall be graduates of colleges, and there shall 
be no distinction of sex in the pay schedules. If this should 
receive the assent of the majority of both men and women 
teachers, it would settle the salary question permanently. 

" There are some other features in the plan which will 
commend it to the public ; and this in spite of the fact that 
any breaking up of the accustomed system of high school 
education will do away with many cherished associations 
and require a good deal of personal adjustment to new 
conditions by meritorious educators. For a long time it 
has been sought to make the system more flexible, so as to 



224 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

meet the various needs of the young in so large a com- 
munity. It is true that under the present methods the high 
schools are all overcrowded ; but that is a problem by itself. 
While the large attendance shows that present opportu- 
nities are appreciated, it does not prove that more variety 
in opportunity would not be welcomed. Under the plan 
proposed the upper six years would afford this in greater 
measure than now. The first three years, a sub-high school 
course, would lead either to three years more of work in 
the regular high schools preparing for college or to a like 
period in trade or manual training high schools. 

" It is this principle which will have to receive more 
consideration in the future, whether it comes through the 
plan involved in the somewhat precarious chances of the 
proposed charter or whether it is attained in a more grad- 
ual manner. Industrial and commercial education has now 
become an absolute necessity. There is absolutely no lack 
of agreement that the great progress made by the German 
nation recently in a country very poor in natural resources 
and maritime facilities, is due more than anything else to 
its marvelously thorough education in handicrafts and 
business. The need is met here in a very haphazard and 
imperfect way at present. Some great manufacturing con- 
cerns have their own schools, which means a withdrawal of 
boys from the advantages of public school education for 
the sake of industrial training the State is just as much 
bound to give as it is to teach Latin or Greek. ^ Many 
young men have practically no training at all which di- 
rectly fits them for what they will have to do in life. The 
effect on the nation's prosperity is bound to show in time. 
The world's business which is a subject of fierce interna- 
tional competition, is not done by untrained men. There 
are some observers who take the matter very seriously. 
Mr. Frank A. Vanderlip, now at the head of the National 
City Bank, reports with something like alarm that in recent 
international exhibitions, he saw no American manufactured 
goods which excelled in merit; they were superior only 
because made more cheaply by the aid of automatic ma- 
chinery. Mr. Vanderlip preaches the need of industrial 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 225 

training in schools, and of financial and business courses 
in the universities, on this text. 

" Obviously, it is the unskilled man who in time of busi- 
ness depression swells the list of unemployed, burdens 
charity and government relief and lowers the whole tone 
of the community. 

" Now, if the boys and girls who are going to work with 
'their hands, the great majority of the population at all 
times, ought to be educated for their work, the education 
should be in the public schools and should begin at the 
earliest possible date. For such, at present, there is a piti- 
fully large number of things they spend time in learning 
which they will proceed immediately and necessarily to for- 
get. If at the age of twelve, when the rudiments of knowl- 
edge and mental discipline have been attained, they could 
be switched into a course of education designed directly to 
fit their needs through life, the benefit to them and to the 
community would be instantly apparent, and the provision 
for the classical courses of study would not be harmed by 
their absence." 

The following was sent in reply to a letter received in 
May, 1908: 

June 4, 1908. 
Mr. Henry C. Wright, 

Secretary, City Club of New York, 
55 West 44th Street, New York. 
Dear Sir: 

In reply to your communication of May 29th, asking for 
my opinion on the so-called " Six-and-six " plan recom- 
mended by Mr. J. Edward Swanstrom, I submit the follow- 
ing: 

I myself and the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers, of which I am president, heartily endorse Mr. 
Swanstrom's plan in so far as it establishes the principle 
that the positions in the school department should be care- 
fully graded, that one salary should be attached to each 
grade of position, and then that the person occupying any 
of these positions should receive the salary attached to the 
position, regardless of sex. 



226 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I agree with the general opinion that our High School 
Course as at present planned and conducted is practically 
a failure, and I would welcome any change that would tend 
to keep more of the 600,000 pupils attending our public 
schools in school until they have completed some so-called 
High School Course. 

It may be that what may seem to be a trifling expense, 
viz: the weekly carfare and luncheon account necessary 
when pupils have to travel long distances to High Schools, 
is keeping quite an appreciable number of pupils from con- 
tinuing their education. Mr. Swanstrom's plan would, to 
a large extent, overcome this objection, — if it be one — since 
the beginning years of the secondary course would be car- 
ried on in various elementary school buildings more con- 
venient to the pupils of the various neighborhoods. I think 
there is no doubt in the mind of anyone who has given much 
thought to the subject that many pupils, both boys and 
girls, would remain longer in High School if they found it 
possible to carry on their work which would fit them for 
business or industrial life, and did not — as they now do in 
a great majority of cases — find themselves ;compelled to 
follow a course designed especially to fit pupils for college. 

I have never suggested or requested that men be confined 
to any particular grades in our schools. I have said and I 
do say that the Elementary Schools, even as constituted to- 
day, can be splendidly managed without any men teachers. 
In proof of this assertion, I refer to Public Schools, Nos. 
3, II, and 44, Brooklyn, under my own supervision, as 
schools having no men teachers, and yet ranking, as they 
have ranked for many years, among the best schools in the 
city. I agree, however, that men are least desirable in the 
lower grades of the elementary schools. But in any case, 
I beheve that the city is always able to do justice, and that 
justice in the salary schedules will not prevail until people 
occupying the same position, under the same restrictions 
and requirements, receive the same pay. 

Though I have not had time to make even an approxi- 
mate estimate of the cost of establishing Mr. Swanstrom's 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 227 

plan, I know that it would be more expensive than the adop- 
tion of the schedules submitted by our Association. The 
schedules suggested by Mr. Swanstrom have the same mini- 
mum as ours, — $720, and the same maximum within $15, 
his being $1620, and our $1635. There is a difference in 
the increment, however, — Mr. Swanstrom's being $75, and 
ours $105, which is the present increment for male teachers 
in the lower grades of the elementary schools. His bonus 
of $120 for boys is the same as that suggested by us. His 
minimums for heads of department and principals of ele- 
mentary schools are the same as in our schedules. There- 
fore the great mass of teachers would be paid under Mr. 
Swanstrom's plan very nearly the same salaries as were in- 
corporated in our original " Equal Pay Bill," but the salaries 
suggested in the high school are higher than those which 
we asked for. I therefore must object to the statement that 
the " Six-and-six " plan will be a lighter burden for the 
taxpayers than the plan proposed by the Interborough As- 
sociation of Women Teachers. 

While it is true that the auditor of the Board of Educa- 
tion prepared a detailed estimate " which shows that to 
equalize the salaries of the sexes on the basis of the salaries 
paid to men teachers will increase the budget of the Board 
of Education by the amount of $9,100,000 a year"; it is 
also true that the women teachers at no time asked that the 
salaries for teachers in the grades of the first six years 
be increased to the salaries paid by the Board of Educa- 
tion, but not required by the Davis Law, to the male teachers 
in grades of the first six years. tWe believe that the adop- 
tion of the salary now paid to the men in those years, from 
the first year through the eighth year of experience, would 
form an equitable and satisfactory schedule for all teachers 
in those grades. In this connection we do not acknowledge 
the criticism that we were thus reducing the salaries of men 
teachers as a just one, because while any male teachers in 
those years receiving more than $1635 could not have their 
salaries reduced, all male teachers in those grades not yet 
receiving the $1635 would be free to seek promotion into 
grades where the higher salaries could be obtained under 



228 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the State Law, and the beginner would have eight years in 
which to seek and obtain such promotion. 

In conclusion, while I cannot speak formally for the 
12,000 women teachers in my Association, I have every 
irfeason to believe that they would agree with me in ap- 
proving on the whole Mr. J. Edward Swanstrom's new 
plan for schools. 

Yours very truly, 

Grace C. Strachan, 

President, Interborough Asso- 
ciation of Women Teachers. 



CHAPTER XX 

GLEDHILL-FOLEY BILL 

We deferred an appeal to the Legislature of 1909 until 
the fate of the report of the Charter Revision Commission, 
of which William M. Ivins was chairman, had been settled. 
This report, while making no reference to salaries in the 
chapter on Education, elsewhere provided for " like sal- 
aries " for " Hke positions." Early in April we were defi- 
nitely informed that the " Ivins Charter " would not pass. 
Then we prepared a bill containing the schedules included 
in the report of the Conciliation Committee and also a 
clause restoring the " fourth mill." This was introduced 
by Senator Reuben L. Gledhill, Republican, of Kings, and 
Assemblyman James A. Foley, Democrat, of New York, 
and so became known as the " Gledhill-Foley " bill. It 
passed the Senate by a vote of 38 to 3, and the Assembly, 
126 to 14. It was vetoed by Mayor McClellan after a hear- 
ing on May 11, 1909, and as the Legislature had then ad- 
journed, it could not be re-passed. It is worthy of note 
that only 6 of the 86 members of the Legislature from New 
York voted against the bill. 

It was opposed by practically the same people with prac- 
tically the same arguments as the White Bill of 1907. 

The Board of Education's meeting hastily called as shown 
by the Globe, May 6, 1909 : 

" Last Monday the by-law committee of the Board drew 
up a report in opposition to the bill, and it was agreed that 
a special meeting should be held at 4.30 o'clock this after- 
noon to adopt it. 

" Whether or not it was because of fear of opposition to 
the report or whether or not it was to prevent the women 
teachers from learning of the contemplated action and look- 
ing to forestall it, has not been disclosed, but it is known 

229 



230 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

that it was agreed to keep secret as long as possible the 
fact that the meeting was to be held. The notices of the 
meeting were not sent out until yesterday, many of the com- 
missioners not receiving them until this morning. A public 
announcement of the meeting was not made. So well were 
the plans laid that those who are directing the fight upon the 
bill do not anticipate any opposition to the report to-day." 

And the Glohe of May 7, 1909, said : 

" Without any discussion, the Board of Education at a 
special meeting held yesterday adopted resolutions con- 
demning the teachers' salary bill now before the mayor as 
revolutionary and detrimental to the schools, and asking 
the mayor to veto it. 

" As told in The Globe yesterday it had been decided last 
Monday to hold the meeting, but the decision was kept a 
secret and few of the members were notified until yester- 
day morning. Everything had been carefully planned and 
was carried out without a hitch, although the members had 
to wait until long after five o'clock to get a quorum. The 
telephone was called into requisition and the desired mem- 
bers were secured. Twenty-seven were present. 

" They include Messrs. Aldcrofft, Barrett, Coudert, 
Bruce, De Laney, Dresser, Cunnion, Ferris, Francolini, 
Gfeene, Higgins, Hallick, Katzenberg, Kanzler, Lazansky, 
May, Man, McCafiferty, Harrison, McDonald, O'Donohue, 
Sherman, A. Stern, J. E. Sullivan, Wilsey, Wingate, and 
Winthrop. When the motion to adopt the report was put 
there was a division. Probably six or eight members op- 
posed it, leaving less than a majority of the entire board in 
favor of it. President Winthrop declared the report 
adopted." 

The Board in its report of disapproval, said : " An analy- 
sis of said bill shows that it contains thirty different sched- 
ules of salaries for members of the supervising and teach- 
ing staff in elementary schools, and nine schedules for 
members of the supervising and teaching staff in high and 
training schools." (Extract from report of Committee on 
By-Laws and Legislation.) 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 231 

As a matter of fact the said bill contains onh^ four dif- 
ferent schedules for elementary schools as at present or- 
ganized, with specific " bonuses " for teachers of " mixed " 
and " boys' " classes and schools ; while it contains only 
four schedules for high and training schools, with an ad- 
dition of $150 in mixed schools and $30 in boys' schools. 

The apparent increase in the number of schedules is 
really an increase in the number of " bonuses." The pres- 
ent schedules provide a bonus of $60 per annum for female 
teacher of mixed boys' classes. 

What the Board makes to appear like eight diflferent 
schedules for grades below 7A, is really one schedule — • 
$720 to $1620, with bonuses as follows: 

Kng. I A — 2B Mixed, no bonus; lA — 2B Boys, $60; 
3A— 4B Mixed, $60; 3A— 4B Boys, $132; 5A— 6B Mixed, 
^y2; 5A— 6B Boys, $180. 

Our present schedules give a principal or an assistant to 
principal of an all girls' school the same salary as a prin- 
cipal or an assistant to principal of a mixed or a boys' school. 
Now it is well known that it is more difficult to manage a 
boys' school than a girls' school: it is harder (a) to keep 
the classes all supplied with good teachers, (b) to keep 
the buildings and playgrounds in good condition, (c) to 
maintain discipline. And so the Conciliation Committee 
decided to extend the " bonus " policy established by the 
Davis Law for teachers in the elementary schools, all 
through the system. This is indicated in their schedules 
which follow: 



Assistant to Principal Supervising Grades of the First Six- 
Years 

(Increment, $150) 

Girls' 
Year School 

I $1,800 

3 2,100 



Mixed 


Boys' 


School 


School 


$1,950 


$2,100 


2,250 


2,400 



232 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



Principal of at least Twenty Classes in Grades of the First 

Six Years 

(Increment, $250) 

Girls' 
Year School 

I $2,450 

4 3>200 



Assistant to Principal Supervising in Grades of the Seventh 
and Eighth Years 

(Increment, $150) 



Year 
I . . . 

3 ••• 



Mixed 


Boys' 


School 


School 


$2,600 


$2,750 


3-350 


3.500 



Girls' 


Mixed 


Boys' 


School 


School 


School 


.$1,950 


j$2,IOO 


$2,250 


„ 2,250 


2,400 


2,550 



Principal Having Tzventy-Five or more Teachers in the 
Grades of the Seventh and Eighth Years 

(Increment, $250.) 



Year 
I . . , 

4 ... 



Girls' 


Mixed 


Boys' 


School 


School 


School 


.$2,700 


$2,850 


$3,000 


. 3450 


3,600 


3.750 



In our brief to Mayor McClellan on Gledhill-Foley bill, 
we said : " Mr. Harrison and Mr. Stern intimated by their 
remarks on variations in salaries of teachers according to 
whether they taught girls' mixed, or boys' classes, and on 
variations in the salaries of principals according to the 
number of classes supervised, that such bases of variation 
in salaries would be an innovation. We respectfully sub- 
mit that the present charter of this city (See Sec. 1091) 
and the By-laws of the Board of Education (See Sec. 65, 
sub-division 8, " Principals of schools of not less than 12 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 233 

classes — ," "A principal of a school with a high school 
department, having supervision of not less than ^5 teachers 
in the aggregate (elementary and high) shall receive, in 
addition to the salary provided in Schedule I, the sum of 
$500 per annum " ; sub-division 9, " Teachers in charge of 
schools of the fourth order (less than 12 classes but not 
less than 6 classes," — " less than 6 classes " ; sub-division 
14 (a) "A principal of a high school having supervision 
of not less than ■?5 teachers, — " (b) " A principal of a high 
school having supervision of less than 2^ teachers " ; and 
sub-division ii, "A female teacher of a boys' class, or 
of a mixed class as defined in sub-division i of this sec- 
tion, shall receive the sum of $60 per annum in addition, 
etc.") prove that it is the settled policy of the Board 
of Education to pay principals according to number of 
classes, and to pay teachers of mixed and boys' classes 
higher salaries than teachers of girls' classes. It therefore 
seems unfair to charge that this bill in continuing this 
policy will cause more political scrambling for promotion 
than there is now. 

"It is charged by some that Senate Bill 1210 does not 
provide ' Equal Pay ' and by others that it provides more 
than ' Equal Pay.' We have found the spirit of our cam- 
paign embodied most tersely in the expression ' Equal Pay 
for Equal Work " ; but what we are actually seeking is 
"Salary for position without regard to the sex of the in- 
cumbent." The Gledhill-Foley schedules are based on this 
principle. 

" This bill has been approved by : 

(i) The Interborough Association of New York, com- 
prising over 12,000 members; 

(2) The New York City Teachers' Association, con- 
sisting of thousands of men and women teachers, princi- 
pals, and superintendents; 

(3) The Association of Women Principals of the City 
of New York; 

(4) The Association of Assistants to Principals, Brook- 
lyn; 

(5) The Class Teachers' Association. 



234 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

It has been endorsed by 

( 1 ) The Brownsville Taxpayers' Association ; 

(2) The Central Flatbush Taxpayers' Association ; 

(3) The Central Federated Union, representing over 
200,000 voters; 

(4) The Central Labor Union, representing many thou- 
sands ; 

(5) The City Federation of Women's Clubs; 

(6) Thousands upon thousands of individual taxpayers ; 

(7) Scores of firms and business houses. 

" But above and beyond all in importance, unless we deny 
our own political institutions and principles, must we value 
the endorsement given by The People through their regu- 
larly elected representatives in our State Legislature, after 
three years of public agitation on the question of the dis- 
crimination against our women teachers. 

" Opposed to this vast majority striving to give the 
women teachers the relief they seek are a few men who 
represent only themselves as individuals, or the minority 
that constitutes a majority vote at meetings of a few self- 
constituted organizations, not authorized to represent any 
taxpayers but themselves. 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers fur- 
thermore asks you to consider the trustworthiness of the 
statements made by Mr. Abraham Stern, representing the 
Board of Education in opposing this bill ; because ten years 
ago in opposing the bill which became the " Davis Law," 
he claimed that the cost of said bill would be $26,000,000 — • 
it cost about tive million. He claimed that it was revolu- 
tionary, arbitrary, dangerous ; and he characterizes Senate 
Bill 1210 in the same way. Yet after ten years' experience 
of the Davis Law he and the other members of the Board 
of Education are unanimous in their appeal for the reten- 
tion of the Davis Lazv. Is it not fair to believe that if you 
sign our bill and it becomes law, that its beneficent effects 
on our school system will be such as to cause a similar 
change of heart ? 

" We do not admit that the number of basic schedules 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 235 

is increased by the new law, while admitting that basing 
the salaries on the sex of the pupils taught instead of on 
the sex of the teacher, has increased the number of ' bo- 
nuses ' for mixed and boys' classes. 

" It is true to-day that in Brooklyn nearly all of the chil- 
dren in the first year of high school, which is the 9th year 
in this 12-year course, are housed in elementary school 
buildings. We believe that the children will be greatly 
benefited by having the course of study so readjusted as 
to make an intermediate or sub-high school for children of 
the 7th, 8th, and 9th years, this intermediate or sub-high 
school being, in many cases, vocational or trade, in others 
commercial, and in others purely literary ; thus leaving the 
last three years of the twelve for a true high school course 
to be followed by such pupils as intend to go on to college 
or go on to complete their studies in the profession or call- 
ing chosen. It is a matter of general criticism that the pres- 
ent course of study is prepared for those who are to enter 
college, although over 95 per cent of the children who are 
taught under it never even enter high school. 

" However, though the Committee was strongly in favor 
of the Six-and-Three-and-Three plan, variously known as 
the ' Swanstrom Plan,' and the ' City Club Plan,' and the 
' Six-and-Six Plan,' there is nothing in the bill which forces 
any such reorganization on the Board of Education. True, 
there is a schedule of salaries provided for schools, con- 
sisting of grades of the 7th, 8th and 9th years, but until 
such schools are established, such schedule of salaries is 
inactive. 

'' Still, there is no law or principle that makes an increase 
in the number of schedules undesirable. The intimation 
made by both Mr. Harrison and Mr. Stern, that the pro- 
posed bill would compel the Board of Education to reorgan- 
ize the school system is not borne out by fact. There are 
at present girls' schools, mixed schools, and boys' schools. 
It is true that under the present law, principals and assist- 
ants to principals and teachers are paid under various ' male' 
and ' female ' schedules, i.e., schedules varying according 
to the sex of the principal, assistant to principal and teacher 



236 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

— e.g., Miss O'C, principal of a school of 60 classes of boys 
and girls receives $1000 less a year than Mr. O'M, princi- 
pal of a school of 12 classes, while the bill under discussion 
proposed to pay said teachers and supervisors according to 
the sex of the pupils taught and supervised, and so provides 
bonuses for those in mixed and boys' schools. 

" In making this readjustment, the Board of Education 
would decide what constitutes a mixed school, just as it 
has decided that a ' mixed class ' for purposes of bonus 
salary must have 40% of boys on register. 

" This bill is objected to on the ground that it is manda- 
tory. It is true that the bill is mandatory, but how, in the 
nature of the case, could it be otherwise? Do we expect 
the child of Irish parents to be Hindoos, for instance? Do 
we look for sweet apples on a sour apple tree ? Or, as Sena- 
tor McCarren has put it: * If you wanted to mend a hole 
in a granite wall, you would not use a Charlotte Russe.' 
So, we admit that these provisions that we are asking you 
to approve as an amendment to the ' Davis Law,' are manda- 
tory. But we beg you not to consider this amendment as 
you would original mandatory legislation, but as an amend- 
ment to mandatory legislation over which you had no con- 
trol. 

" Likewise, in considering the ' four-mill ' provision, we 
appeal to you to remember that 

(i) The Board of Education prays that the present man- 
datory provisions in the city charter, fixing salaries and a 
minimum tax rate, be continued ; 

(2) All the teachers unite in asking for the restoration 
of the fourth mill ; 

(3) Over 90% — all the women teachers and many of 
the men teachers — approve the Gledhill-Foley Teachers' 
bill; 

(4) Fully 90% (165 out of 182) of the members elected 
to the State Legislature by the voters of this city, after 
three years of public agitation on the question, voted in 
favor of this bill ; 

(5) We are supporters and defenders of a government 
in which " the majority " rules ; 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 237 

And therefore, we pray that you will agree with us that 
respect for "Home Rule," "Fair Play," and "The Ala- 
jority " demands your approval of this bill. 

GRACE C STRACHAN, President. 

But — the Mayor did veto the bill. He however, in his 
veto message this time recognized the importance of the 
measure by promising to appoint a commission to investi- 
gate the question of teachers' salaries. He later indicated 
that he realized that the problem was one worthy of serious 
and dignified consideration, by naming as members of such 
commission, Hon. Joseph H. Choate, ex-Ambassador to 
Great Britain ; Hon. William C. Brown, president. New 
York Central Railroad, and Professor John Bates Clark, 
of Columbia University. The first named declined the ap- 
pointment and the second resigned after one meeting be- 
cause he could not spare the time he believed such an in- 
vestigation would require. Their places were filled by the 
appointment of Joseph M. Schwab, president of the North 
German Lloyd Steamship Company, New York, and Charles 
Hallam Keep, president of the Knockerbocker Trust Com- 
pany. The report submitted by this commission to Mayor 
McClellan just prior to the close of his term of office stated 
that they had not been able on account of lack of time, to 
make such an investigation as would justify a definite re- 
port. They made several alternative suggestions which 
added nothing to the previous discussions and arguments 
connected with the great struggle of the women teachers. 

The matters to be investigated by the special commission 
are explained by the mayor as follows : 

" First, the average rates of living of teachers, both male 
and female, in this city, and to ascertain, if possible, the 
general trend of responsibilities which they have to meet on 
the salary offered to them by this city. 

" Second, to compare, as near as possible, the salary rates 
in other cities with those offered to teachers in this city. 

" Third, to investigate and accurately determine what 
increase to the budget such recommendations as they may 
deem proper to submit will make." 



238 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The New York World, of May 29, 1909, said the follow- 
ing editorially : 

" New York's public school teachers naturally object to 
the proposed public inquiry into the method and the cost 
of their living. We have gone to great lengths in our soci- 
ological bookkeeping, but always it has been in the wrong 
direction. We invade the privacy of the self-respecting 
poor on the slightest provocation. Admonished on every 
hand to look after certain elements at the other end of the 
social scale, we do nothing. 

" The worst possible use of publicity is to expose respect- 
able poverty or modest thrift to the gaze of the multitude. 
The best possible use of publicity is to throw daylight upon 
all those supplicants who, aided by favoring laws, are reap- 
ing where they have not sown. 

" Every beneficiary of privilege should be held to a strict 
public accounting, but none is exacted of him. Every self- 
supporting American is entitled to exemption from the in- 
quisitorial activities of students, theorists and meddlers, 
but he alone is probed, measured and tabulated." 

Democracy, of same date, commented as follows in its 
leading editorial: 

*' The equal pay bill of the school teachers has been vetoed 
by Mayor McClellan, but the teachers have the encourage- 
ment of knowing that their battle is further advanced than 
it ever was before. Indeed, it has progressed so far that 
they will, without question, win the next battle, which will 
be next year. They cannot fail again. A commission 
is to be named to investigate the average rate of compensa- 
tion received by teachers in other communities and the cost 
of living. The results of this investigation will undoubtedly 
show that the teachers here are underpaid, and that at the 
end of the year they are worse off than the same class of 
public workers in other sections of the country. The 
women school teachers are educated and refined women. 
They have been accustomed to refined surroundings. And 
it is absolutely necessary that their environment should be 
refined, for if this were not so, their usefulness as teachers 
of the young would lose greatly in value. Clothing, food 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 239 

and rent are dearer in this city than in any other place in 
the world. And amusements and luxuries are dearer too, 
and every rational human being knows the absolute need of 
amusement and luxuries. Any person receiving only the 
necessaries of life is soon reduced to the level of beasts. 
They fail mentally and physically. They retrograde in- 
stead of advancing. In nearly every other calling a trade 
or a profession is learned, and then the work of study, save 
the study of experience, is over. But a teacher has to keep 
on studying and learning. She cannot say that her pro- 
fession is learned, for it is never mastered. No matter how 
far ahead she goes there is still more ground to traverse. 
She is not permitted to wait and rest, for there is always 
a steady pushing from the rear, and she has to fight to keep 
in the lead or she will fall hopelessly behind. Besides study- 
ing books she has to study human nature. She must be 
patient, and tender, thoughtful and forbearing. She has no 
time for the nursing of her own woes, for she is always 
attending to the woes of others. There is no chance on 
earth for her to get more than she earns, and none of our 
public men need fear that she will be overpaid. But all of 
our public men, and every man of public spirit ought to do 
what he can to see that she is not underpaid. We are sure 
that the commission to be named by the Mayor will be an 
excellent commission, and that its report will end in giving 
the women teachers the same pay as that received by the 
men teachers, and this will be done, we believe, without 
troubling the legislature." 

And again on June 12, IQ08: 

" Miss Smith may be able to live as well as she wants on 
ten dollars a week, while Miss Jones would require twice 
as much to secure only those things which she would con- 
sider absolutely necessary. Nor does a teacher's responsi- 
bilities enter into this subject any more than do the ques- 
tions of charity, sympathy, or love. The whole question is 
purely a business one. To say that a person ought only to 
receive enough compensation to enable him to live is ab- 



240 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

surd. He is entitled to the sum he earns whether it be 
ten dollars a week or a thousand dollars. Do the women 
teachers labor as long and as truthfully as the men? Are 
they as necessary in the schools as the men? Would the 
city be better off if there were no women teachers? These, 
it seems to us, are the salient points. 

" And if these questions are answered favorably to the 
women, then comes the question of compensation. And 
it would be impossible to thresh out this question carefully 
enough to separate the chaff from the grain without also 
discovering whether the compensation of the men teachers 
is just. If this is .answered in the affirmative, then the 
question whether the women teachers ought to receive the 
same pay as the men, for the same work answers itself. 
And the result would be that when the Board of Estimate 
meets to consider the budget of 1910, the school appropria- 
tion will be big enough to place the women on the same 
plane as the men in the matter of pay." 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE SOMERS RESOLUTION 

On December 22, 1909, Commissioner Arthur S. Somers, 
presented the following resolution in the Board of Educa- 
tion: 

" Resolved, That it be referred to the Committee on By- 
Laws and Legislation to consider the advisability of 
amending the By-Laws as follows: 

" That Section 65 of the By-Laws of the Board of Edu- 
cation be amended so as to provide but one salary for one 
and the same position, except that the teachers and super- 
visors of boys may receive an additional salary or bonus 
not to exceed $180; 

" Resolved, That it also be referred to said Committee 
to consider the advisability of amending said section in the 
following manner: 

" That such revised schedules be put into efifect as soon 
as funds sufficient therefor are provided by the Board of 
Estimate and Apportionment, and that pending full finan- 
cial ability, the increases in women teachers' salaries be 
paid in annual instalments which shall be not less than 
twenty per cent, of the difference between the maximum 
salaries now fixed for men and the maximum salaries now 
fixed for women occupying the same position, except that 
for the year 1910 there shall be a flat increase of not less 
than $120 per annum for all women teachers below the 
7 A grade, and not less than $120 for all women teachers 
of special subjects." 

The L A. W. T. submitted in this connection the fol- 
lowing : 

If the " Equal Pay " principle is recognized, the Inter- 
borough Association of Women Teachers is willing that 

241 



242 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the increases necessary to establish this principle be paid 
in three or four annual instalments. 

To establish the '' Equal Pay " principle the Board of 
Education would need to classify its positions, and fix but 
one salary for each class of position ; except that teachers, 
assistants to principals, principals and other supervisory 
officers of boys may receive an additional salary or 
" bonus," said bonus not to exceed $i8o for teachers in 
the elementary schools. 

Pending adoption of " Equal Pay " schedules, the fol- 
lowing increases are suggested as the first instalment : 

ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 

A^. B. — The numbers of principals, assistants to princi- 
pals, and teachers indicated below are those submitted to 
the Board of Estimate, October, 1909, by the Board of 
Education for the year 1910. 

Increase for Women Teachers based on Twenty Per Cent. 

196 Principals, i, ($3500-$250o), *or $200 $ 39,200 

380 Assts. to Principals, ^, ($2400-$ 1600), *or 

$160 60,800 

20 In charge of Schools, ^, ($2400-$ 1600), *or 

$160 3,200 

II Senior Teachers in Charge, i, ($2i6o-$i54o) 

*or $124 1,364 

607 $104,564 

*A^. B. — The difference between the present maximums 
for men and women. 

Present Schedule IIL 

739 Kindergarten. 
837 I a grade. 
1,024 lb grade. 

Salaries for women range from $600 to $1240. 
Annual increment, $40. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 243 

860 2a grade. 
962 2b grade. 
881 3a grade. 

Salaries for men range from $900 to $2160. 
Annual increment, $105. 
918 3b grade. 

870 4a grade. 

871 4b grade. 
805 5a grade. 

According to year of service, limit: 12 for 
men, 16 for women. 
777 5b grade. 
611 6a grade. 
565 6b grade. 

It is suggested that maximum in these grades 
be $1635 for boys' classes and $1515 for girls' 
classes, to apply to both men and: 
40 Miscellaneous women teachers; 
62 Ungraded; 
205 More than i grade; 
65 C, 

Special English Class to Foreigners; 
90 D., 

Special " Working Paper Class " ; 
361 E., 

Special " Over Age " Children Class. 



11,533 

11,533 teachers scheduled at $120 equals $1,383,960. 

All Women Teachers under present Schedule IV. 

550 7a grade. 
437 7b grade. 
363 8a grade. 
25 Miscellaneous. 
9 More than i grade. 

1,384 



244 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

1,384 Women Teachers under present schedule IV at ^, 
($2i6o-$i32o), or $168 equals $232,512. 



Women under present Schedule V. 

298 8b grade. 
9 More than i grade. 
I C. 
I D. 
I E. 
4 " In Excess." 



314 



314 under present schedule V., at ^, ($2400-$ 1440), or 
$192 equals $60,288. 



Total 607 Principals, etc $ 104,564 

Total 11,533 Teachers, Kgn. to 6B, etc 1,383,960 

Total 1,384 Teachers, 7a-8a, etc 232,512 

Total 314 Teachers, 8b, etc 60,288 

13,838 Elementary School. Total $1,781,324 



HIGH SCHOOLS 

Women 

2 (Lib. asst.), i, ($i200-$iooo), or $40 

10 (Cler. asst.), i, ($i2oo-$iooo), or $40 

10 (Lib. asst.), i, ($i20o-$iooo), or $40. . 

29 (Jun.), i, (($i200-$iooo), or $40 ... 

570 (Asst.), i, ($2400-$ 1 900), or $100 ... 

21 (First asst), i, ($3000-$250o), or $100 



.$ 



80 

400 

40c 

1,160 

57,000 

2,100 



642 



$61,140 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 245 



TRAINING SCHOOLS 

Women 

I (Cler. asst), i, ($i20o-$iooo), or $40 

3 (Lib. asst.), i, ($i2oo-$iooo), or $40 

62, (Model Tr.), ^ ($240o-$i5oo), or $180 

13 (Critic), ^, ($2400-$ 1 500), or $180 ... 

52 (Asst), ^, ($2400-$ 1 900), or $100 

8 (First), \, ($30oo-$25oo) , or $100 ... 



141 



39 
52 
23 
115 
62 

3 

6 

27 



Special Teachers. 

Women 

(Music) $1400 

(Drg.) 1400 

(P. Trg.) 1200 

(Cook.) 1200 

(Sew.) 1200 

( Shop. ) 1200 

(French) 1400 

(German) 1400 



80 

120 

11,340 

2,340 

5,200 

800 



$19,880 

Men 

$1600 

1600 

1600 



*2i6o 
1600 
1600 



327 

2,2y Special Teachers at $120 equals $39,240. 
About 450 Clerks or additional Teachers increase 25 
cents per day for 194 days of 1910 equals $21,825. 

Additional for those who have reached Maximum in 
Present Schedules. 

180 Women principals, $200 additional $ 36,000 

1,500 Kng. — 6B, $120 additional 180,000 

912 7a-8a, $168 additional 153,216 

340 8b, 192 additional 65,280 

160 Special, etc., $120 additional 19,200 

13 Jun., $40 additional 520 

261 Asst., $100 additional 26,100 

10 First, $100 additional 1,000 

3.376 $481,316 



246 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



SUMMARY 

Based on 20% 

196 Principals. Total increase instalment. . .$ 39,200 

380 Asst. to Prin. To increase instalment. . 60,800 

20 Asst. in Charge, 6 to 1 1 classes , . 3,200 

II Teachers in Charge, less than 6 classes. . 1,364 
11,533 Teachers, Kgn. — 6B and others paid 

under present Schedule III 1,383,960 

1,384 Teachers, 7a-7b-8a and others paid 

under present Schedule IV 232,512 

314 Teachers, 8b and others paid under pres- 
ent Schedule V 60,288 

642 Teachers, High Schools 61,140 

141 Teachers, Training School for Teachers. 19,880 

327 Teachers, Special Subjects , 39,240 

450 Teachers, Additional or Clerks 21,825 



15,398 $1,923,409 

If possible allow 3,376 having reached maxi- 
mum 481.316 

For Principals, teachers and others to fill vacan- 
cies and provide for increase in system .... 95-275 



$2,500,000 
To the Board of Education : 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers of 
the City of New York respectfully submits the following 
statements in connection with the report made to your 
Board by the Committee on By-Laws and Legislation at 
the meeting of January 12, 1910, on the resolution offered 
by Mr. Somers, December 22, 1909. 

The report referred to states that " the principle of Equal 
Pay for men and women teachers occupying the same posi- 
tion is the principle involved in the first of the resolutions 
offered by Mr. Somers. It further states that " the Board 
of Education disapproved Senate Bill No. 893," the so- 
called " Equal Pay " or " White Bill " on Alarch 22. 1907, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 247 

and that on May 6, 1909, your committee presented a re- 
port in opposition to Senate Bill No. 1210, known as the 
" Gledhill-Foley Bill," which provided salaries for teach- 
ers in various grades without regard to sex, which report 
was approved by the Board of Education. 

Our Association admits all the above but it is surprised 
at the following: " Your Committee is aware of no change 
in the situation up to the present time which would justify 
it in recommending that the Board reverse the action 
taken by it on the occasions above referred to." 

We respectfully submit that the Committee must know 
that since May 6, 1909, the following members have been 
appointed to the Board of Education: 

Miss Olivia Leventritt, 

Mr. Herman A. Metz, 

Mr. Frank L. Polk, 

Mrs. Helen C. Robbins, 

Mr. John Whalen, 

Mr. Patrick F. McGowan, 

Mr. Antonio Pisani, M.D., 

Mrs. Alice L. Post, 

Mrs. Christine Towns. 

In view of the fact that these nine new members have 
been added to the Board and that there are still two vacan- 
cies, it is inconceivable to this Association that the Com- 
mittee on By-Laws and Legislation should be " aware of 
no change in the situation up to the present time, etc." 

We submit further, that at the meeting of May 6, 1909, 
at which the so-called " Gledhill-Foley Bill " was disap- 
proved, there was not a majority of the whole Board of 
Education recorded against it. Only twenty-seven Com- 
missioners answered roll call, and members of this Associa- 
tion who were present at said meeting heard several 
" Noes " when the negative vote on the report of the Com- 
mittee on By-Laws and Legislation was called for by the 
presiding officer. Besides, the meeting of May 6, 1909, 
was not a regular meeting of the Board of Education, but 
was a special meeting, the notices of which were not re- 
ceived by some members until the very day of the meeting 



248 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

and by most of the members only the day previous. 
Furthermore, said meeting- was not in session five minutes, 
and we believe that many of the members of the Board 
of Education are prepared to give more time than that to 
the consideration of this vital subject. 

In contrast to such hasty action as the above, we re- 
spectfully submit that during the past three years the 
Senate, the Assembly, the Governor of the State, the 
Mayor of the City of New York, and the citizens assembled 
in various Mass Meetings, have given several hearings on 
the principle involved in the " White Bill," the " Gledhill- 
Foley Bill " and the resolutions offered by Mr. Somers, 
and in no case has the hearing been shorter than two hours. 
When said bills have come before either house of the 
Legislature for final decision, the vote has always been taken 
by recording each individual member's vote either for or 
against, and the vote has always followed a full and free 
discussion, lasting on several occasions upwards of three 
hours. In contrast to an attendance of 2y members out 
of a board of 46 — an attendance of 58.7 per cent. — was 
the attendance of the Assembly Committee on Affairs of 
Cities at the hearing on the "White Bill" when 13 out 
of a committee of 13 sat throughout a hearing lasting three 
hours — 100 per cent, of attendance. 

We submit also that in disapproving the " White Bill," 
the Board of Education faced a complex proposition, be- 
cause beside the principle of salary for position without 
regard to sex, the " White Bill " involved the four-mill 
tax, a minimum salary of $720, a minimum annual incre- 
ment of $105 and a maximum number of increments of 
twelve. A similar statement is true of its action on the 
" Gledhill-Foley Bill," as this bill involved not only the 
same salary for m.en and women teachers occupying the 
same position, but the so-called Six-and-Six Plan, and 
fixed salaries in detail, varying for girls', mixed, and boys' 
schools. 

Therefore, we submit that the Board has never placed it- 
self on record as approving or disapproving the simple 
principle, "' That men and women teachers occupying the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 249 

same position shall receive tJie same pay"; and we there- 
fore beg that your Board, without referring the said pro- 
position to any Committee, let the teachers and the pubHc 
generally who are striving to have this principle embodied 
in all the salary schedules of our teachers, know the atti- 
tude of the Board of Education on this simple proposition. 
Respectfully submitted, 
The Interborough Association of Women Teachers, 
Grace C. Strachan, Isabel A. Ennis, 

President. Secretary. 



CHAPTER XXII 

DISCRIMINATIONS OTHER THAN SALARY 

Since we began '' agitating " for Equal Pay, we have 
experienced discriminations other than salary. By far the 
most unjust of these is that connected with the assignment 
and promotion of teachers. 

In one school, this attitude was indulged and permitted 
to such an extreme, that there was not a woman teacher 
on the " top floor " although the classes were as follows : 

Girls Teacher 

i6 Joseph 

15 Robert 

12 Michael 

13 Pat 

14 Fred. 



Grade 


Boys 


8b. 


24 


8A. 


23 


7B. 


18 


7B. 


18 


7A. 


26 


7A. 


27 



13 Ernest • 

Totals 136 83 

It is probable that if this school had been located in an 
" American " district, the parents of the girls would have 
expressed dissatisfaction ; but it was in an Italian section 
and the parents were more or less unacquainted with the 
language and life of the country. So the principal con- 
tinued to carry out his intention as expressed to one of the 
women teachers, " I would put up the most incompetent 
man before I would put you up," until our association 
brought the facts to public notice. Finally one woman 
was promoted. Surely, even those who hold that men 
are needed for " growing boys " will not hold that " grow- 
ing girls " — especially girls from an almost tropical clime 
— need men teachers to the absolute exclusion of women. 

250 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 251 

The unfairness that consists in assigning a woman 
teacher to a girls class in a department, so as to deprive 
her of the bonus of $60.00, though her program makes 
her teach boys a large portion of the day, promises to bring 
about another legal suit against the board. On this point, 
the Globe recently printed a letter of which the following 
is a part: "... under the rules of the board a teacher 
whose class has more than 40 per cent, boys receives $5 a 
month extra pay. But the officials have decided that this 
bonus shall be determined, not by the classes taught, but by 
the class for which the teacher calls the roll. By separat- 
ing boys and girls at roll call a few teachers keep the 
register for all the boys and get the extra pay and the 
others lose it, even though during the rest of the day they 
may devote their teaching hours wholly to boys' classes. 

" One teacher in a certain school has for four years 
received the bonus for a boys' class. She taught twenty- 
nine of the thirty-two class periods a week, and last year 
had altogether 470 boys and 510 girls. Under the new 
schedule she is given a girls' class. She is teaching in the 
classroom thirty-one full periods a week, and has a total 
of 515 boys and 460 girls. She loses the extra pay, as do 
two other teachers, simply because she keeps the registry 
for a girls' class, though her teaching hours are increased 
and she is teaching a larger proportion of boys than before. 
Two of the four teachers in this school now in charge of 
boys are men. Incidentally (this for those who maintain 
that boys need the instruction of men), one of these men 
teaches girls' classes more than one-half his time each 
week, and has more girls than boys in his total, while the 
other has each week eight hours respite from teaching, 
while no woman teacher has more than two hours and 
some only forty minutes outside the classroom." 

The editor of the Globe in his reply to the above, said : 
" Such a plan is of doubtful legality. The teachers who 
believe that they are being deprived of the bonus illegally 
should file a claim for it with the By-Laws Committee of 
the Board of Education. The charter is expHcit. It says 



252 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

' and no female teacher of a boys' or a mixed class shall 
receive less than $60.00 per annum more than a female 
teacher of a girls' class of a corresponding grade and years 
of service.' " 

Some propose that men should be assigned only to higher 
grades. I am opposed to the limiting of the places to 
which men shall be appointed, just as I am opposed to 
limiting the places to which women shall be appointed. 
History shows in the lives of Frobel and Pestalozzi that 
men have been successful teachers even in the kinder- 
garten and history of more recent date shows in one of 
our American cities that a woman can be a successful 
superintendent of schools. In this connection, the follow- 
ing editorials anent this woman superintendent are interest- 
ing: 

New York World, July 30, 1909. " Mrs. Young, though 
she follows many distinguished educators in the place, is 
probably better equipped for the service than any of them." 

New York Tribune, August i, 1909. " There are several 
reasons why a woman should be especially fitted for the 
position of school superintendent. . . . Chicago, always 
daring in its innovations, has chosen a woman for super- 
intendent of its public schools. There can be no question 
of her high qualifications for the place. . . . That she was 
unanimously chosen in competition with men is either a 
high tribute to her personal worth or to the intelligence of 
the members of the Board of Education, who decided the 
case on its merits, eliminating entirely the question of sex." 

New York Globe, July 30, 1909. " What will the educa- 
tionists who have sounded an alarm against the feminization 
of our schools have to say of the selection of a woman as 
superintendent of the schools of the second largest city 
in the country? , . . But, after all, it is not the educa- 
tionists who will be most disturbed. Whatever her in- 
tellectual gender, it is clear that Mrs. Young has been 
chosen because of her superior fitness for the position." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 253 

Brooklyn Times. " Chicago contains a population only a 
little less than that possessed by the Borough of Manhat- 
tan. She is the second city in size in America. Her school 
problems must be something like those of Greater New 
York. The Chicago Board of Education is composed of 
men. This woman must possess unusual ability and force 
of character to have won to her support a body that 
would naturally be prejudiced against her sex. Given a 
man of equal ability in opposition, he should easily have 
been the victor, with only men acting as judges. But Mrs. 
Young through her own inherent abilities, broke down all 
these old-time prejudices and carried off one of the 
highest prizes in the educational world." 

Again we read, " Mrs. Agnes Knox Black has just been 
appointed professor of elocution in Boston University. She 
was chosen from among several score of candidates most 
of whom were men. 

" Miss Ruth Carrell has been appointed assistant profes- 
sor in department of bacteriology in the University of 
Michigan. She is looked upon as one of the most brilliant 
young women in the covmtry. 

" Miss Margaret E. Cross is professor of education in 
Tulane University." 

DISCRIMINATIONS OTHER THAN SALARY 

In contrast, is the experience of those who have opposed 

Equal Pay. Many of them have been rewarded. Mr. S 

was made teacher in charge of annex to Manual Training 

School. Miss G who publicly stated that she did not 

believe in " Equal Pay " was given a district superintend- 

ency; as was also Mr. E the first president of the 

Association of Men Teachers and Principals, organized to 

oppose the women's association. Mr. T was given the 

principalship of a high school. The following also is 
significant : 

"Holders of Permanent License No. i (Men only) 



254 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

whose records are satisfactory, and who desire to serve as 
teachers in charge of study room (teachers of English) in 
the recreation centers during the season of • 1908-1909, 
should present themselves at this office (Room 422), on 
Wednesday, November 4, or Thursday, November 5, or 
Friday, November 6, 1908, at 4 p. m. The compensation 
for this work is $2.50 per session. No examination, written 
or oral will be required." 

Neither in law, in logic, nor in fact, is there any ground 
for holding that the proposed legislation infringes in any 
way upon the principle of home rule, or is mandatory 
legislation in the sense that it interferes with the account- 
ability of any local authority to the people of the locality. 



What is municipal home rule? It is a local government 
accountable to the people of the locality. What does this 
mean? It means a government conductled by officials 
accountable to the people of the city for their official con- 
duct. 

This is fundamental and elementary. 

It was to accomplish this result in the case of city govern- 
ment in New York and Brooklyn that, after twenty-five 
years of effort, we at last secured a mayor, elected by the 
people, with full authority to appoint and remove at his 
pleasure heads of city departments ; and in the last charter 
of New York no head of a department holds office for any 
fixed term whatever. This is home rule as far as it has 
yet gone in the government of the City of New York. We 
can at least hold the Mayor responsible for the conduct of 
his heads of departments. If our street cleaning commis- 
sioner does not do his duty, or our police commissioner 
is derelict, we can appeal to the Mayor, and the Mayor 
can remove him at pleasure. 

Now, in what sense is the Board of Education account- 
able to the people of New York City? Its members hold 
offices for fixed terms of five years, and are irremovable 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 255 

except upon charges and a regular trial. What this means 
we know from abundant experience in New York, where 
for years and years the heads of departments held office 
for fixed terms and were not removable except on regular 
charges and after a trial at which they were entitled to be 
represented by counsel. They never were removed, and 
each one managed his department as he pleased. 

Suppose the people of New York are dissatisfied with the 
way in which the Board of Education manages educational 
affairs, what can the people do about it? Suppose the Mayor 
is dissatisfied, what can he do about it? The charter in 
terms excepts the Board of Education from the control 
of the Mayor. They are neither elected nor are they 
removable by any elected official. They hold an utterly 
irresponsible position, accountable to nobody but them- 
selves for their official conduct. 

How, then, is the principle of home rule infringed when 
this irresponsible, independent body is given more or less 
power? It may be wise to give them more, it may be 
wise to take some of their power away ; but there is no 
more home rule involved than there is when the Legislature 
says what the duties of the superintendent of prisons should 
be. I suppose the superintendent of prisons would feel that 
his " home rule " was interfered with if the Legislature 
decided that it was for the best interests of the State to 
change its regulations with regard to his office. 

How, then, either as a matter of law, of logic or of fact 
can the Board of Education, which is not accountable for its 
acts to the people of New York City or to local officers 
elected by the people of New York City, be regarded as 
an illustration of the principle of home rule? 

ir 

From time immemorial education has been in the special 
care of the State. Education is a State function. No State 
in the Union has ever surrendered this function, or has 
abdicated the right to exercise the function. 

Th'e Constitution of the State of New York, in Article 



256 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

IX, declares that the Legislature shall provide for the 
maintenance and support of a system of free common 
schools wherein all the children of this State may be 
educated — all the children of this State; not some of them, 
but all of them. Whether the children happen to be resi- 
dents of New York City or of Chemung County, the 
Constitution says that the Legislature shall provide for 
the maintenance and the support of schools in which they 
shall be educated. 

And there is no member of the Board of Education who 
does not know that the Board is not a city department. It 
is an independent corporation, created such in terms, as 
the agent of the State, to carry out and administer what- 
ever policy the State determines in the matter of education 
in New York City. The City of New York, as such, has 
absolutely no control whatever over the Board of Educa- 
tion. It has no superior except the New York Legislature. 
If the Board of Education does wrong, if it has too much 
power, or if it has too little power, there is no authority 
to which to appeal to right the wrong, to diminish or to 
increase the power, except the Legislature. The Mayor 
has nothing whatever to do with either the grant or the 
exercise of any power by the Board of Education. Its 
members are not his subordinates. His opinion with regard 
to the conduct by the Board of Education of its affairs 
is of no more legal consequence than that of any other 
citizen of the State. 

In my opinion, the sending of this bill to the Mayor of 
New York for his acceptance, after its passage by the 
Legislature, was of very doubtful necessity. It hardly 
seems a special city law under the definition in Article 
XII, section 2, of the Constitution, which says, " Special 
city laws are those which relate to a single city or to 
less than all the cities of a class." This was a bill affecting, 
not the corporation of the City of New York, but affecting 
a special corporation created by the Legislature to per- 
form a special task, namely, to carry out and administer 
the legislative policy as to education within the physical 
area of the City of New York. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 257 

The Gunnison case, decided by the Court of Appeals in 
1903 (176 N. Y., 11), states very clearly the precise legal 
status of the Board of Education. The decision is by a 
unanimous court, consisting- of Chief Judge Parker and 
Judges Gray, Bartlett, Haight, Cullen, Werner and 
O'Brien, unanimously affirming a decision of the Appel- 
late Division, Second Department, made by Goodrich, P. 
J., and Bartlett, Woodward, Jenks and Hirschberg, //., 
Justice Hirschberg writing the opinion at the Appellate 
Division and Justice O'Brien in the Court of Appeals. 

A teacher sued the Board of Education for salary. De- 
murrer was interposed on the ground that the City of New 
York was the proper party to be sued, because the Board 
of Education was a city department, like the Dock De- 
partment, for example. 

" It is apparent from the general drift of the argument 
that the learned counsel for the defendant is of the opinion 
that the employment of the teachers in the public schools 
and the general conduct and management of the schools 
is a city function, in the same sense as it is in the case 
of the care of the streets or the employment of police and 
the payment of their salaries and compensation. But that 
view of the relations of the city to public education, if 
entertained, is an obvious mistake. The city cannot rent, 
build, orbuy a schoolhouse. It cannot employ or discharge 
a teacher, and has no power to contract with teachers 
with respect to their compensation. There is no contract 
or official relation, express or implied, between the teachers 
and the city. All this results from the settled policy of the 
State, from an early date, to divorce the business of public 
education from all other municipal interests or business, 
and to take charge of it as a peculiar and separate func- 
tion through agents of its own selection and immediately 
subject and responsive to its own control. To this end 
it is enacted in the general laws of the State that all school 
trustees and boards of education shall be corporations, 
with corporate powers, which, of course, includes the power 
to sue and be sued in all matters relating to the control 
and management of the schools (School Law, title 8, section 



258 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

7). These corporate powers are expressly conferred upon 
this defendant by the City Charter (Section 1062). 
. . . The only purpose for which the defendant was created 
a corporate body was to conduct a system of public educa- 
tion in a designated division of the State, and manage and 
control the schools therein. This obviously includes the 
employment and payment of teachers, and none of these 
powers or functions are conferred upon the city as such. 
The only relation that the city has to the subject of public 
education is as the custodian and depositary of school 
funds, and its only duty with respect to that fund is to 
keep it safely and disburse the same according to the in- 
structions of the Board of Education. ... If the State has 
departed from the settled policy that has prevailed since its 
organization of keeping the work of public education and 
the control and management of its schools separate and dis- 
tinct from all other municipal interests and business by 
the selection of its own agents and clothing them with cor- 
porate powers to represent the schools, such as school 
districts and boards of education, and has devolved these 
powers and duties directly upon the city, we would naturally 
expect to find such a departure and notable change expressed 
in language so clear that no doubt could arise as to this 
change of policy. If the Board cannot be sued for teachers' 
wages, and the teacher must resort to a suit aginst the city, 
then surely the Board must have sunk into a mere city 
agency, and it no longer has any use for independent cor- 
porate powers. Public education then becomes a city func- 
tion, exposed to the taint of current municipal politics, and 
to any and every mismanagement that may prevail in city 
departments. . . . We have seen that the policy of this 
State for more than half a century has been to separate 
public education from all other municipal functions, and 
to entrust it to independent corporate agencies of its own 
creation, such as school districts and boards of education, 
with capacity to sue and to be sued in all matters involved 
in the exercise of that corporate power. . . . The learned 
counsel for the defendant must, therefore, be able to point 
to some new and plain provision of the present charter 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 259 

that abolishes the long-settled poHcy of the State and re- 
duces the Board of Education to a mere city agency, in- 
capable of being impleaded in the courts as a defendant 
upon one of the contracts it made for the employment of 
teachers in the schools." 

The Court of Appeals then holds that there are no such 
provisions in the charter, but that, on the contrary, the 
Board of Education remains what it always has been, an 
independent corporation, the agent of the State for the 
maintenance and support of such system of education as 
the State decides shall be supported and maintained within 
the physical area of The City of New York. 

Nor is this all. The State has never hesitated, either in 
New York or in the other States of the Union, to take 
effective measures to compel a given locality to raise by 
taxation sufficient funds to maintain a proper system of 
education. When the State standard of what should be 
expended for education, in view of the general interests 
of the public, is higher than the local standard the locality 
sometimes fails to raise enough money by taxation to sup- 
port the schools according to the State standard. To meet 
this niggardliness on the part of the local taxing officers, 
resort is sometimes had to the conferring of direct powers 
of taxation on boards of education, or to mandatory legisla- 
tion directing that such and such a per cent, of the annual 
tax levy in the locality shall be devoted to school pur- 
poses. 

When the Greater City of New York was created the 
experiment was tried of having the Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment act upon the budget which the Board of 
Education prepared, setting forth the needs of the depart- 
ment of education. Experience soon made it clear that the 
Board of Estimate and Apportionment would not willingly 
allow a sufficient sum adequately to support education in 
New York. The Legislature was compelled, therefore, to 
state a minimum figure and to order that at least that 
amount should be collected in The City of New York and 
devoted to the purposes of education. This is the origin 
of the four-mill provision contained in the so-called Davis 



26o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Law of 1900, now incorporated in section 1064 of the New 
York Charter. 

When the city authorities announced that property in 
New York would thereafter be assessed at one hundred 
per cent, of its market value, it was thought that the four- 
mill provision would produce more money than was needed, 
and the city authorities asked the Legislature, therefore, to 
reduce the four mills to three. This was done in 1903. 
But the raising of the assessed values to one hundred per 
cent, of the market value never really materialized, and 
the three-mill provision has proved insufficient. This pro- 
posed bill, therefore, restores the original four mills to be 
spent for purposes of education. 

Since, therefore, both law and logic and the actual exist- 
ing facts require that if any change is needed in the policy 
or method of administration of education in New York 
City, the State and State only can compel the change, to 
what authority except the State, shall those appeal who 
believe that the present policy of the Board of Education in 
New York City is unjust? The Mayor cannot change the 
policy and the Board of Education announces that it will 
not change the policy. 

THE CRITICISM OF THE PROPOSED BILL BECAUSE IT IS MAN- 
DATORY 

The proposed bill is criticised because it is mandatory. 
It is hard to speak of this criticism with respect. The 
Board of Education is the mere agent of its principal, the 
State. All the powers of the Board are and must be granted 
by mandatory legislation. There is no other way. 

It is a familiar principle of the law of agency, and a 
maximum of common sense, that when the principal em- 
ploys an agent it is the principal, and not the agent, who 
determines the terms and conditions of the power of attor- 
ney given the agent. That is precisely the situation here. 
The Board of Education is the agent of the State, acting 
for the State, not under an irrevocable power with terms 
so broad that the agent is left free to work his own will. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 261 

Such a situation would be absurd. It would be an abdica- 
tion by the State of one of its fundamental duties. All 
legislation in regard to the Board of Education is neces- 
sarily a command, a mandate. The real question is whether 
the mandate which the State gives is wise. In the year 
1900 the State gave the Board of Education a certain man- 
date under which the State has now become convinced 
gross injustice has been committed. It now revokes that 
mandate and declares another policy which in its opinion 
is unjust. Up rises the agent, the Board of Education, 
and says : " This is mandatory legislation which undoes 
the injustice, and therefore the legislation is unwise. You 
are interfering with our right to do what we please." 

THE HOME RULE AND MANDATORY LEGISLATION ARGUMENTS 

Mayor McClellan's veto messages of both the " White 
Bill " and the " Gledhill-Foley Bill " included " Home Rule " 
Objections. On this point, Horace E. Deming in his 
Memorandum in support of the White Bill after the Mayor's 
veto, said : 

Governor Hughes in his veto message said : (Gov. Hughes 
Veto pp. I, 3, and 4 to parenthesis). 

" The Board of Education of the City of New York con- 
sists of forty-six members, appointed by the Mayor for 
terms of five years respectively. They are excepted from 
the general provisions of the charter authorizing the Mayor 
to remove public officers holding office by appointment from 
him, whenever in his judgment the public interest shall so 
require, and are removable only on sustained charges. 
While styled the head of an administrative department, 
the Board of Education, by the terms of the charter, pos- 
sesses the power and privileges of a corporation. As such, 
it sues, and may be sued. It has ' the management ' and 
control of the public schools, and of the public school 
system of the city, subject only to the general statutes of 
the state, relating to public schools and public school in- 
struction and the provisons of the charter." 



262 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

GOVERNOR hughes' CLEAR AND DECISIVE NEGATION TO THE 
HOME RULE OBJECTION 

" Apart from the power of the Mayor to appoint and 
remove as stated, and the duty of the city to supply the 
funds required, the Board of Education exercises its pozvers 
independently. It is not subject to control by the city 
AUTHORITIES. There is no contract or official relations be- 
tween the teachers and the city. The city cannot be sued 
upon the contracts made by the board. This results, as the 
Court of Appeals has said, from ' the settled policy of the 
state from an early date to divorce business of public 
education from all other municipal interests or business,' 
and from the creation of the Board of Education as a 
corporate body ' to conduct a system of public education 
in a designated division of the state and manage and con- 
trol the schools therein.'" (Gunnison v. Board of Educa- 
tion, 176 N. Y. on pp. 16, 17.) 

" The Board of Education is thus directly subject to the 
control of the Legislature, and whatever provisions may 
be found necessary or wise for the purpose of defining its 
powers or prescribing its policy, must be prescribed by the 
Legislature. No other authority is competent to make such 
proz'islon. 

" But while the Legislature has power to deal with every 
phase of the matter, the course which experience approves, 
is that certain general principles, of action should be laid 
down, and that within these principles, freedom with refer- 
ence to details of management should be left to the sub- 
ordinate body acting with peculiar knowledge of local con- 
ditions. 

" (N. B. The ' White Bill' sought to lay down the gen- 
eral principle, ' that, where men and women are both em- 
ployed under any particular schedule, there shall be no dis- 
crimination in salary on account of the sex of the incum- 
bent.'— G. C. S.) 

" When the so-called Davis law was passed in 1899 
(signed by Governor Roosevelt, May 3, 1900), it was 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 263 

thought important to the educational interests of the city 
that certain minimum salaries for teachers should be pre- 
scribed, as well as minimum annual increments, presumably 
to improve the service. In these prescribed minima, wide 
differences appear between the amounts payable to men and 
to women. These control the Board of Education only as 
minimum requirements, but the practice has been to pay 
women less than men, and under the by-laws adopted by the 
board glaring inequalities now exist.' " 

City Superintendent Maxwell speaking at Milwaukee, 
1905, said : " The best means hitherto found to enable the 
state to reinforce without discouraging local authorities is 
the enactment by its legislative branch of the laws laying 
down minimum requirements and making of regulations 
by its educational ofifiicers, which shall have the force of 
laws. These laws should embrace at least the following 
provisions : A minimum salary for the teachers that shall 
be in some degree commensurate with their training, etc." 

HOME RULE AND THE DAVIS LAW 

From Report of the New York City Superintendent of 
Schools, 1900: 

" It may be inferred that there must have been some- 
thing extraordinary in the local conditions to call for the 
enactment of this Statute (the Davis Law) by the Legis- 
lature. Such indeed was the case. Stated briefly, the most 
obvious reason why the teachers had the support of the 
press and the public and the sympathy and co-operation of 
the Governor was that the Board of Estimate and Appor- 
tionment had failed to provide the funds necessary to carry 
into full effect a comparatively mild measure regarding 
teachers' salaries which the Legislature had passed in 
1899 (the Ahearn Law.) This statement is the exact truth, 
and it was the truth that appealed so strongly to the press, 
the public, and the legislative authorities. 

" In 1897 the New York Board of Education came to 



264 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

realize the absurdities and injustices of the system of pay- 
ing teachers, and made many honest and strenuous efiforts 
to remedy abuses by adopting new salary schedules. Every 
one of these efforts was rendered abortive by the failure 
of the Board of Estimate and Apportionment to provide 
the funds necessary to carry the revised schedules into 
effect. Even the attempt of the Legislature in 1899, known 
as the Ahearn Law, to cut the Gordian knot was nullified 
in the same way — the Board of Estimate and Apportion- 
ment did not supply sufficient money." 

From report of the New York City Superintendent of 
Schools, 1907. 

" We struggled along for three or four years under 
very great financial difficulties, which caused serious injury 
to the school system, and kept up constant irritation and 
agitation among the teaching force. These difficulties 
reached their culmination in the school year 1899- 1900, 
when for months no salaries were paid to teachers in the 
Boroughs of Queens and Richmond, when the salaries of 
many teachers were arbitrarily reduced. — So great was the 
unrest — that a comprehensive measure was introduced into 
the legislature by Senator Davis. 

" It (the Davis law) put an end to an almost intolerable 
condition with regard to teachers' salaries. — Under these 
circumstances I cannot but regard the Davis law as having 
been of very great advantage to the schools. I sincerely 
trust that it will be maintained on the statute book as a 
defense against capricious changes in teachers' salaries, until 
something better is provided." 



THE GOVERNOR S REASONS FOR SIGNING THE DAVIS BILL 

On signing the bill May 3, 1900, Governor Roosevelt 
attached a memorandum containing this statement : " The 
general purpose of the bill is admirable, and the best educa- 
tors, the men most interested in seeing the schools of 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 265 

Greater New York put upon a thoroughly efficient basis, 
most thoroughly favor the measure. The Ahearn Law was 
rendered nugatory by the action of the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment. This action plunged affairs into chaos 
and rendered legislation absolutely necessary ; the present 
bill being drawn primarily merely to meet the pressing 
necessity created by this action and by the chaos into which 
it threw the schools. The general purpose of the bill is so 
good, the change so vitally good, and the provisions as a 
whole will tend so much to the betterment of the schools 
that I deem it best to sign the bill." 

That the Board of Education itself has not hesitated to go 
to Albany for relief, appears in the Minutes of said Board, 
e. g. 

The minutes of the Board show that in 1887, when Hewitt 
was Mayor, the Board under the presidency of J. Edward 
Simmons, appealed to the Legislature to re-open the budget. 
This request was granted and $150,000 obtained for the 
relief of financial stress in the New York school system. 

Similar action was taken in 1902. 

The appended extract from the minutes of the meeting 
of February 24, 1904, shows exactly how the Board 
appealed for relief when it found itself facing a deficit of 
$381,343.72 — $250,000 of which was needed to operate the 
recreation centers and playgrounds. At this meeting a 
special committee comprising Felix M. Warburg, Jacob W. 
Mack, A. Stern and William Lummis, submitted the fol- 
lowing report: 

"After careful consideration of the needs of the system 
and possible methods of raising money to meet existing 
and threatened deficiencies, your committee is of the opinion 
that there is but one practical way of securing funds. This 

IS THROUGH AN ACT OF THE LEGISLATURE, which permits 

the re-opening of the Budget. For this action there is 
ample precedent in the year 1902. It has been learned that 
such a bill has been introduced, at the behest of the City 
Administration, into both houses of the Legislature." 



266 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The committee then offered the following resolution, 
which was adopted : 

" Resolved, That Senate Bill No. 498, which has for its 
purpose the granting of power to the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment to reopen the Educational Budget for 
the year 1904, in order to provide mone3's necessary for 
the unimpaired maintenance of the public schools, and 
which has been introduced., be, and it is hereby approved, 
and that the city's legal representative be requested to take 
active steps to further the passage of this measure." 

This information is of value in refuting arguments that 
the Board has never appealed to the Legislature. 

That New York state is not unique in this matter ap- 
pears from the following: 



MORE PAY FOR TEACHERS IN UTICA 

The bill which will enable the School Board of Utica to 
increase the salaries of the school teachers has been passed 
by the Legislature and after being approved by the mayor 
and Common Council will be returned to Albany for the 
signature of the governor. The measure raises the limit 
for school appropriations. 

Governor Hughes signed this bill. 



PLAN TO GET MORE MONEY FOR SCHOOLS 

Legislation is being sought in Tennessee which will pro- 
vide that twenty-five cents on $100 of taxable property in 
Memphis shall be set apart for school purposes. This 
with the state appropriation, will create a fund sufficient 
to meet the current expenses of the schools, but it is 
claimed by the Board of Education that the funds for the 
new school buildings that are imperatively demanded to 
meet the needs of the situation as it is now presented to 
them must be provided by a bond issue. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 267 

From Milwaukee — " With a view toward enabling the 
teachers to receive the full increase contemplated by the 
committee on rules (of the school board) the legislature 
at its ensuing session will be asked to enlarge the amount 
that may be raised by taxation beyond the present limit 
of 3^ mills on each dollar of assessed valuation. 



WORKING FOR A STATE SCHOOL SYSTEM 

" A state, rather than a local, school system, is proposed 
for Pennsylvania by the Educational Commission appointed 
by Governor Stuart, two years ago, and bills putting it 
into effect are now before the legislature of that state. The 
control of the schools is taken from the cities and towns 
and lodged in the state, which will direct them through a 
board of seven regents, appointed by the governor. Pro- 
vision is made for a state superintendent. 

" Cities, towns and villages are classified into three divi- 
sions, according to population, and the school boards thereof 
are to be elected. In the cities the boards will consist of 
fifteen members, appointed by the courts ; in second class 
districts the boards will have nine members, three elected 
every two years for six-year terms, while the smallest dis- 
tricts will elect boards of five, one member being chosen 
each year for five years. Board powers in conducting the 
schools are given to these boards, subject to the general 
regulations of the state regents. 

" Methods of taxation are to be uniform, the boards 
being limited to levying not more than 10 mills on the 
dollar in the big cities. Textbooks cannot be changed 
oftener than five years, and the lists of such will be pre- 
pared by the state. Provision is made for the education of 
all children and for their transportation where necessary. 
Compulsory education laws modelled after those of this 
state are included. 

" Colleges of education in Pittsburg and Philadelphia 
are to be opened and normal schools throughout the state 
will be incorporated in the school system." 



CHAPTER XXIII 

HOME RULE AND MANDATORY LEGISLATION 

All the opponents of the Women Teachers forget the 
" Home Rule " and " Mandatory " arguments when the 
proposition to omit the " Davis Law " from the revised 
charter is under consideration. Witness the following ex- 
tracts from Mr. Shumway's pen as printed in the Eagle, 
Dec. 20, 1908: 

To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle : 

" Do the people of New York realize that in the pro- 
posals of the Charter Revision Commission is involved no 
less danger than the placing of the public schools under 
political control? That this a real and not a fancied danger 
is made plain in Chairman Ivins' testimony before the Cas- 
sidy Committee. Mr. Ivins said : 

" I am a home ruler ; I do not know any reason why the 
Legislature should be called upon to fix the salaries of 
teachers or firemen or scrub women or policemen, or any- 
thing else . . . The theory of the Charter Commis- 
sion is that all salaries hereafter should be fixed by the 
Board of Estimate and Apportionment . . . Our 
commission believes in the doing away of the fixing of any 
minimum or maximum salaries by the Legislature." 

It is worth while to compare with the above the words 
of the Court of Appeals, quoted approvingly by Governor 
Hughes in his veto of the White Bill : 

" The settled policy of the state from an early date has 
been to divorce the business of public education from all 
other municipal interests or business." (Gunnison vs. 
Board of Education, 176, N.Y.) 

With the Board of Estimate in absolute control of school 
finances, what is there to prevent a return to the conditions 

268 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 269 

described by Superintendent Maxwell in his report, as fol- 
lows : 

" We struggled along for three or four years under very 
great financial difficulties, which caused serious injury to 
the school system, and kept up constant irritation and agi- 
tation among the teaching force. These difficulties reached 
their culmination in the school year 1899-1900, when, for 
months, no salaries were paid to teachers in the boroughs 
of Queens and Richmond, when the salaries of many teach- 
ers were arbitrarily reduced ... So great was the 
unrest . . . that a comprehensive measure was intro- 
duced into the legislature by Senator Davis. 

"It (the Davis Law) put an end to an almost intolerable 
condition with regard to teachers' salaries . . . Under 
these circumstances, I cannot but regard the Davis Law 
as having been of very great advantage to the schools. I 
sincerely trust that it will be maintained on the statute book 
as a defense against capricious changes in teachers' salaries, 
until something better is provided." 

" There are real dangers to pupils and teachers in the 
proposed revision of the educational chapter of the city 
charter. 

i" First, as to tenure of office. Is it understood that 
teachers are not protected by civil service rules? That if 
the present charter protection were repealed, the teacher 
of long, ' fit and meritorious service ' may, at the end of any 
year, be simply " not re-engaged ? " That retention may be 
conditioned not on school service, but on political service- 
ableness? That the chief victim of such a condition will 
be the child ? 

" Second, as to salaries. Is it understood that the salary 
of one year will furnish no assurance regarding that of 
the ensuing year? That the salary of $1,300 one year may 
be reduced the next year to $1,000 or $900? That this 
would be true even if the provision guarding tenure were 
retained, or even if teachers were put under civil service 
rules? The case of Walters vs. City of New York (119 
Appellate Division Reports 464) decided in May, 1907, 
clearly establishes this point. Judge Gaynor's iconcurring 



270 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

opinion expressly states: 'The said board (Estimate and 
Apportionment) has the power to reduce as well as in- 
crease salaries, to readjust the scale of salaries in any 
department on the recommendation of the head thereof, 
and the courts have no right to hamper it in the exercise 
thereof." 

Is it understood by parents and teachers that the repeal 
of the Davis Law (carrying down with it, of course, the 
mandatory three mills )^ signifies a relapse to the old condi- 
tions when tenure, salary and promotion hung absolutely 
on the will of the machine boss? When the teacher who 
gave " the right party " a liberal " rake-off " on his salary 
was the favored one, and no parent could secure fair treat- 
ment of his child as against such " influence? " Is it under- 
stood that the schools have a way of " going to the dogs " 
under such " home rule " in New York City ? 

E. S. SHUMWAY. 

Brooklyn, Dec. 19, 1908. 

Now, of course, the repeal of the Davis Law would not, 
of necessity, " carry down with it, of course, the mandatory 
three mills," as the " three mill " law constitutes Sec. 1064 
of the Charter, while the " Davis Law " as now understood 
is Sec. 1091. Neither is the "tenure of office" affected by 
the Davis Law. As to the closing statements of Mr. Shum- 
way's letter, I can only say that I was in the Brooklyn 
schools six years befofra the "Davis Law" W'as enacted, 
and I consider such aspersions on the Board of Education 
totally unwarranted. It is unfortunate reflection on the 
one who confesses knowledge of such illegal transactions. 
The Globe of May 7, 1909, commented thus: 
" In the report of its By-law committee in opposition to 
the teachers' salary bill, adopted yesterday by the Board of 
Education, one of the reasons given for opposition to the 
bill was that the proposed schedules ' provide not minimum 
rates of salary, but absolute rates which the Board of Edu- 
cation can neither increase nor diminish, thus depriving the 
Board of Education and the city authorities of all rights 




Senator Grady, 



"Equal Pay" Oratok. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 271 

which inhere in them in the matter of fixing salaries of 
members of the supervising and teaching staff. 



BUT— 

In the report on charter revision, adopted by the board, 
the fixing of salaries by the State was favored in the fol- 
lowing declaration: 

" Your committee is of the opinion that the principle 
embodied in section 1091 of the present charter (state pro- 
tection of teachers' salaries) should be embodied in the 
new charter or the proposed administrative code." 

The Board of Education again in May, 1910, petitioned 
the Legislature to retain the Davis Law in the revised char- 
ter. While Women Teachers need not Fear the Abolition 
of the Davis Law, because : 

1st. Governor Hughes's references in his message on 
our bill, to the " glaring inequalities " and " gross in- 
justices " of the present salary schedules, and the public 
sentiment aroused during the past two years, practically 
guarantees the women teachers against reduction in salary. 

2nd. The only salaries that have been increased since 
the adoption of the Davis Law have been those of teachers 
and supervisors not protected by the Davis Law, namely: 

(a) Male teachers in grades below 7A, — (For such the 
Davis Law provides no minimum or maximum after a 
specified term of service.) 

(b) Teachers and supervisors of special subjects. 

(c) District Superintendents, Associate City Superinten- 
dents, and City Superintendents. 

(d) Members of the Board of Examiners. 

N. B. Even the Attendance (Truant) Officers — the only 
employees other than members of the supervising and teach- 
ing force who are paid out of the general fund — have had 
their maximum salary raised from $1200 to $1500. 

jrd. City Superintendent Maxwell in speeches at the 
conventions of the National Educational Association and 
at other meetings, has taken the stand that the State should 



272 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

fix and protect minimum salaries of teachers in its public 
schools. 

4th. All teachers agree in the belief that the best in- 
terests of the schools will be served by state protection of 
their salaries ; 

But the following- resolution was unanimously adopted 
at the general meeting of our association, December 5, 
1908: 

Whereas: The Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers of the City of New York believes that the best 
iinterests of the schools are being preserved by the state 
laws which protect the teachers' tenure of office and the 
teachers' pension fund ; and 

Whereas: Said Association while not advocating the so- 
called Davis Law as such, believes that inasmuch as the 
State makes mandatory provision for the common school 
education of all its children between the ages of four and 
twenty-one years, it is but reasonable and logical for the 
'State to make mandatory provision for the payment of 
teachers and other officers required to carry out such man- 
datory provisions, therefore 

Resolved : That the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers of the City of New York exert all its powers 
toward securing such action by the Charter Revision Com- 
mission, the State Legislature, and the State Executive as 
will secure to teachers : 

(a) Just salary schedules in which, there shall be no dis- 
crimination in the salary of a position because of the sex 
of the incumbent ; 

(b) The present State protection of the tenure of office 
of teachers ; 

(c) State protection of teachers' pensions, which shall 
not vary with the sex of the teacher or officer pensioned ; 
and 

(d) The moneys necessary to carry out such schedules 
as may be established under (a) above, by providing that 
the city shall set aside an amount not less than four mills on 
every dollar of assessed valuation of the real and personal 
©state in the City of New York, liable to taxation. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

SOME FEATURES OF HEARINGS BEFORE MAYOR MAC CLELLAN 

The Mayor, contrary to all legislative practice, called 
upon the proponents of the measure first. This naturally 
put us at a disadvantage. At the first hearing we were 
surprised by this proceeding, because our experience at 
the three hearings in Albany had led us to expect that the 
opposition would be called for first. Before the second 
hearing, I wrote Mayor McClellan, asking him to reverse 
the order at this time ; but he did not. He even refused 
us a minute for rebuttal ; but that, too, was denied. 

At the hearing on the White bill, we thought it best to 
have members of our own Association present our case : so 
our speakers were Mrs. Curtis Lenihen, as assistant to prin- 
cipal ; Miss Lina E. Gano, as high school teacher, Mrs. 
Annie B. Moriarty, as principal ; Miss Isabel A. Ennis, as 
grammar grade teacher; Miss Emma V. McCleary, as pri- 
mary grade teacher, and myself. 

At the hearing on the Gledhill-Foley bill, we decided to 
have representative citizens speak on our behalf, and more 
than seventy appeared to do so. Their names follow, but 
time permitted only a few to voice their approval. Among 
them were: 

Sen, P. F. McCarren. 

Mr. John C. Freund, Editor and taxpayer. 

Mrs. Belle de Rivera — President of City Federation of 

Women's Clubs. 
Mrs. William Cumming Story — as a taxpayer. 
Rev. Alexander Irvine. 
Lillie Devereux Blake. 

Thos. Freel, a born New Yorker and a taxpayer. 
Senator Gledhill. 
Assemblyman Foley. 

273 



274 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Commissioner Holland, of the Board of Education, repre- 
senting Central Federated Union. 
The opposition has been the same at both hearings : mem- 
bers of the Board of Education ; male teachers ; and repre- 
sentatives of Taxpayers' Associations. I submit some ex- 
tracts from their speeches. The speeches of our advocates 
appear in Part II. Be sure to read them. 

Types of Opposition. 

Mr. De Muth, President of the West Side Taxpayers' As- 
sociation. 
Executive Committee Greater N. Y. Taxpayers' Associa- 
tion. 
United Real Estate Ov^ners' Association. 

" We have with us a representative of the City of New 
York, and one of the members of the Board of Education. 
Here are the underlings of that department, the superior 
officers having refused to give them what they believe they 
were entitled to, etc." 
Mr. Shumway. 

" We are asking that the economic law be regarded, be- 
cause we believe that any violation of this law will react 
to the injury of the schools." 
Mr. Abraham Korn. 

I represent the Harlem Property Owners' Association. 
" Now we all know that men have, since the creation of the 
world, been on a footing a little above the female sex." 

The " Taxpayers' Association " representative, who says : 
" We have educated these young ladies." " We have guar- 
anteed them a position the very day they graduated from 
Normal School." " The taxpayers feel that they have 
treated these young ladies very magnanimously, by guar- 
anteeing to them as soon as they graduate, a profession in 
which they can earn a livelihood, the opportunity to enter 
the public schools of this city and earn their living as 
teachers." " We have, by legislative enactments, taken 
them out of politics," " ive have made provisions for taking 
care of these teachers ; they draw their salaries even during 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 275 

sickness under certain circumstances, and their position is 
waiting for them when they return and are able to do their 
work again." " And there is another provision whereby, 
after twenty years of service, they are allowed, by reason of 
old age, to retire on a certain per cent, of their salary." 
" If they reach the age of thirty years of service, they are 
compelled by law to retire on a certain per cent, of their 
salary." " This illustrates once again the generosity with 
which the teachers of this city are treated by the citizens of 
the city." " The citizens . . . have been very careful 
to go to Albany and carefully legislate our public schools 
out of politics entirely, and thereby safeguard the public 
schools against political influence and interference and 
against all uses of privilege and all of those things." * 

Imagine how hard it is to have to sit and listen to this 
"We," "We," "We," "the citizens," "the taxpayers." 
As if " these young ladies " " these teachers " were brought 
into the City like sparrows or fish spawn from some 
foreign country, instead of being the daughters, sisters, 
and in some few instances the wives and mothers of our 
taxpayers. Hundreds are direct taxpayers. All are in- 
direct taxpayers through their landlord or boarding-house 
keeper. 

As to our pensions, one would think Mr. Levey and 
some other men put their hands in their pockets and gave 
us the money. Instead of which, we ourselves contribute 
to the pension fund from the day we begin to teach under 
a regular appointment, one per cent, of our salaries ; and 
to this, are added all deductions for unexcused absences — 
during 1907 these deductions amounted to $274,743.13 — 
and five per cent, of the excise taxes. Neither is a 
teacher allowed to retire " by reason of age " after twenty 
years, nor is she " compelled to retire " after thirty years 
of service. Not until she is 65 years old can a teacher be 
" compelled to retire " and not then unless she has served 
thirty years. 

Like his companion in opposition to fair play, Mr. De- 

* These are extracts from Mr. Levey's speech at the Mayor's hear- 
ing on the Gledhill-Foley bill. 



276 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Muth, Mr. Levey was astounded by our conduct in daring 
to go to Albany in search of relief. He said, " we are 
confronted with this proposition of the school teachers 
banding together, and going down to Albany to increase 
their salaries ; they have entered upon a systematic cam- 
paign in Albany for this purpose." 

But the footless part of all such argument as Mr. Levey 
and his ilk is that they don't touch the point at issue at all. 
They all jag holes in the field outside even the outside ring, 
without once getting near the bull's eye. Everything they 
say is as true of the men teachers as of the women teachers. 
Is it impossible for them to see that we are simply seeking 
" equal pay for equal work ? " 



CHAPTER XXV 

TEACHERS AND POLITICS 

Much has been said about the " women teachers and 
poHtics." 

To begin with, I think the woman teacher has as much 
right as a man teacher or any other citizen to take an 
active interest in politics — in other words in the govern- 
ment of her country. 

The Constitution says, " All persons born or natural- 
ized in the United States are citizens thereof and of the 
State in which they reside." The officials " elected by the 
people " are elected to represent the women and girls as 
truly as the men and boys. It is their duty to conserve and 
preserve the rights and interests of the women and girls as 
fully as they do those of the men. The women and all 
minors are counted among those who are enumerated for 
the purpose of fixing the' number of representatives a 
State shall have in Congress. It is the duty of women 
teachers to be acquainted with the forms ' of government, 
the governmental policies, and the public history of gov- 
ernment officials. Why should woman not be free to ex- 
press her views on all these subjects, and to do all that 
she properly can to influence the election of such officials 
as she prefers shall represent her? 

On October 27, 1908, the City Vigilance League of New 
York, addressed a circular letter " To the Female School 
Teachers of Ndw York City : — " in which it said, "The 
school teachers of our city compose one of the strongest 
moral forces. They are shaping the characters of our 
children. We must depend upon them to give to many 
thousands their only teaching in veneration for law and 
love for the Constitution and its spirit," and yet because 
members of this league thought that some of the women 
teachers were opposing the re-election of Governor Hughes, 
they in the same letter made several absolutely false ac- 

277 



278 EQUAL FAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

cusations against the women teachers, which led Rev. Mr, 
Parkhurst, the honorary president of said League, and 
other ministers to attack us in a most unwarranted manner. 

As a matter of fact, the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers as an association never took any of- 
ficial stand one way or the other in the gubernatorial elec- 
tion of 1908. There were some members in favor of 
Governor Hughes' candidacy. Naturally, however, there 
were more in favor of Lieutenant Governor Chanler's. 
My personal attitude was expressed in the press at the 
time, in these words, " I am not one who believes in try- 
ing to carry water on both shoulders, and I openly declare 
that I am working zealously as an individual for the suc- 
cess of Mr. Chanler. Besides, we do not believe that there 
is a great moral issue in this campaign. Mr. Chanler's 
attitude on the gambling bills is as clear as Mr. Hughes's. 
Those who favor his election can hardly be accused of 
playing into the hands of the professional race-track 
gamblers, since Mr. Chanler's vote, as presiding officer 
of the Senate, was the decisive vote which brought about 
re-consideration of the bills, and so insured their ultimate 
passage. Furthermore, since his nomination, he has openly 
declared that he will veto any attempt to repeal the Hart- 
Agnew law. 

We have been accused of contributing to the Chanler 
campaign fund. Like all the other accusations made in 
this unfair attack, this is false. Nor do I know of any 
members being asked to contribute. On the contrary, 
some of our members have received the following letter. 
It has been addressed in each case to Miss , indicat- 
ing that those who were sending out the letters were mak- 
ing a direct appeal to women teachers to contribute to the 
Hughes campaign fund." 

HUGHES ALLIANCE 

non-partisan 
34 West thirty-third Street, New York. 

Telephone, 781 Madison Square. 
Chairman, 

Hon. Charles A. Schieren. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 279 

Vice-chairmen. 
R. Fulton Cutting. 
Darwin R. James, Jr. 
Col. Henry W. Sackett. 
Ansley Wilcox. 

Treasurer, 

J. Adams Brown, 

President New Nether- 
land Bank, 
41 West 34th Street. 
Secretary, 

Major F. M. Crosset, 
30 West 33d Street. 

New York, October 28, 1908. 

"As College men, we are fundamentally interested in 
the fight of Governor Hughes to maintain an independent 
and efficient State administration as against a threatened 
return to the old methods of favoritism and inefficiency. 

" This is not a new fight. Columbia men have stood on 
the right side of it since the beginning. 

" The forces which stand behind the opposition to the 
Governor hoping to profit by his defeat, are not playing 
fair. So far, the anti-Hughes campaign has been one of 
misrepresentation, and we are catching up as rapidly as 
possible with the fanciful stories with which the enemies 
of constitutional government are appealing for support, and 
forcing home a truthful statement of facts. 

" There are a dozen or more of these stories in circula- 
tion. The absurd scare that the Governor's re-election 
would mean Blue Law legislation and an attempt to inter- 
fere with the legitimate enjoyments and recreations of the 
people, is one you have doubtless heard. Petitions are be- 
ing sent out to work up anti-Hughes sentiment on just 
such " issues." Each bubble bursts before the first gust 
of truth that blows on it. We hope to do enough truth 
telling to make the Hughes plurality a record-breaker and 
thus vindicate the honor of our State, 

" The undersigned address you on behalf of the Hughes 
Alliance, an organization of Democrats, Republicans and 



28o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Independents, embarked on a campaign of truth-telling in 
support of Governor Hughes. We feel that a failure to 
uphold the purpose of the present administration would 
be not only a reflection on the good name of the State, 
but severe reverse to the cause of good government, and 
that years would be required to regain the ground lost. 

" Can we :count on your assistance to the extent of a 
subscription of $io, or more if possible, to carry on this 
work. We further want your actual support in your own 
election district, and hope you are taking an active part 
in this campaign. 

" Will you ' line up ' with us in order that the good 
work of Governor Hughes, so well begun, may be car- 
ried forward? 

Very truly yours, 

Francis S. Bangs, '78. 
'Benjamin B. Lawrence, '87 Mines 
Herbert L. Satterlee, '83, 
Albert W. Putnam, '97. 
George W. Kirrhwey, L. S." 

The board of education at this same time tried to pass 
what became known as the " Gag Law." Commissioners 
Freifeld, Wingate and Jonas in urging this resolution con- 
fined their criticisms to the women teachers and especially 
to me, as evidenced in the following resolution presented 
by Commissioner Jonas on October 14, 1908: 

" Whereas, In the public press recently appeared state- 
ments to the effect that Miss Grace C. Strachan, a district 
superintendent, had publicly urged employees of the Board 
of Education to electioneer for or against certain candi- 
dates for office because of their attitude toward the so-called 
equal pay bill ; and 

" Whereas, This Board of Education found it necessary 
not long ago to criticise and reprimand this same employee 
for political activity and inattention to duty, which mild 
action and warning has had no apparent effect, be it there- 
fore, 

" Resolved, That the attention of the City Superintendent 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 281 

of Schools be called to the matter, with the request for a 
report to this board." 

The Eagle of October 15, 1908, had this to say of the 
matter : 

"The resolution might have been adopted without ques- 
tion but for the opposition of Samuel B. Donnelly,* who 
was always ready to defend the women in the matter of 
their agitation for equal pay." Mr. Donnelly wanted to 
know what the City Superintendent was expected to report : 
Was it as to whether Miss Strachan had a right to exer- 
cise her privileges? It was an inadvisable resolution. If 
she had neglected her duties, then charges should be pre- 
ferred against her; but if she was doing her duty as dis- 
trict superintendent she had a right to exercise her privi- 
leges in her own time. She was not the only one taking 
part in the campaign or movement. There were others, 
but she was the most successful. He was opposed to the 
resolution in the present form in which it was presented. 

" Mr. Jonas replied that when the matter was up before, 
he had called the attention to the actions of Miss Strachan 
and others, and it struck him that because of their inac- 
tion on that occasion they were to blame for the present 
situation. 

" Abraham Stern said it was a question whether the 
board had a right to interfere if there was no misconduct. 
Instead of investigating Miss Strachan, they should first 
find out if the board had the power to do anything in the 
premises. If there was no misconduct on the part of an 
employee, the board was powerless. He moved that the 
matter be referred to the committee on by-laws and leg- 
islation. 

" With a request that it report at the next meeting," put 
in Mr. Jonas. 

" Robert L. Harrison, the chairman of that committee, 
pleaded with the board not to refer it to him. He wanted 
to know what they were to find out. Were they to read 
the papers to ascertain what Miss Strachan had said? 
Were they to summon witnesses ? It would take six months 

*Mr. Donnelly is now Public Printer. 



282 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

to find out what Mr. Jonas wanted. He should be more 
definite. 

" Mr. Jonas said his intention was plain. If warranted, 
charges ought to be preferred against Miss Strachan. It 
was that he meant. 

" Again Mr. Donnelly entered a protest, saying that 
Miss Strachan was assigned to certain districts, to which 
he and Mr. Schaedle were also assigned. If she was not 
doing her duty they would know it, and would prefer 
(charges against her for it; but they could not prefer 
charges against her for what others were permitted to 
do. There were clerks and other employees of the Board 
of Education who were active in political work. They 
had a right to be. 

" After Mr. Kanzler asked whether the newspaper clip- 
pings to which Mr. Jonas referred, were attached to the 
resolutions, which provoked some laughter, the resolution 
was adopted as amended, and the matter is now in the 
hands of the committee on laws. 

" Miss Strachan was informed last evening of the resolu- 
tion and what had been done, and she was astonished. 
She said she had received permission yesterday afternoon 
from the president of the Board of Education to attend, 
to-day, the hearing upon the educational department budget 
for herself, Miss Gano, and Miss Curtis, two vice-presi- 
dents of the Interborough Association of Women Teach- 
ers, and did not suppose any fault was to be found with 
the action of the association. 

" I have not neglected any of my duties," said she, " and 
therefore do not fear what the Board of Education will 
do to me. As to taking political action, I believe I have 
the right of an American citizen, secured to me by the 
Constitution of the United States, even if I am not a 
voter." 

" Why does not Mr. Jones find out what the men em- 
ployees of the Board of Education are doing? And why 
does he not ask that charges be preferred against them ? " 

The By-Law Committee, at the next meeting of the 
board, recommended the following amendments : 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 283 

" Section i. No member of the supervising or teaching 
staff shall be permitted to join or become a member of 
any club or association or to take part in any movement 
intended or undertaking to affect legislation for or on 
behalf of the Department of Education, or any officials or 
members thereof, or to contribute any funds for such pur- 
pose. 

" Section 2. Any combination or concerted effort among 
the emplo3'ees of the Board of Education to elect or de- 
feat any candidate for public office by reason of his having 
agreed or refused to agree to favor or oppose any legisla- 
tion affecting the salaries of said supervising or teaching 
staff or other employees shall be deemed to constitute gross 
misconduct and insubordination. 

" Resolved, That copies of the foregoing amendment to 
the by-laws be transmitted to the principals of all training, 
high and elementary schools with the instructions that the 
same be read to their teachers immediately." 

" The report was signed by Commissioners Harrison, 
Freifeld and Wingate, Mr. Stern refusing to concur with 
the others. He said he did not approve of the teachers 
electioneering, but that the matter was one which needed 
careful consideration, and asked that the matter be put 
over. Mr. Stern pointed out that no reference was made 
to salaries in the resolution as he thought there should be, 
as there might be other matters which teachers could work 
for or against with impunity. For instance a bill might 
be introduced in the Legislature providing for a different 
way of appointing principals, when he thought the princi- 
pals would be perfectly justified in raising a protest. He 
tried to show how many persons would be affected by the 
by-laws by saying that the Department of Education did 
not consist of only forty-six members but of the entire 
clerical and teaching staffs and 650,000 pupils as well. In 
conclusion he asked that six members stand with him in 
asking that the matter be put over. 

" Mr. Stern got his six men, but Gen. Wingate moved 
to suspend this by-law for the meeting, saying that the 
matter was an important one, and that the Board was con- 



284 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

fronted with an emergency which should be acted on at 
once, f He told of how a delegation of Brooklyn teachers 
had on Tuseday visited the home of a candidate for office 
and asked him to pledge himself in their behalf, with the 
threat that if he refused to give it they would work against 
him. He declared that the 13,000 teachers who had banded 
themselves together were hurting the Board irreparably, 
and as Election Day was so near immediate action should 
be taken. 

" George Freifeld expressed himself as being amazed 
at the stand Mr. Stern had taken, and said that the 650,000 
children he had spoken of were being affected at the present 
time worse than they would be if the by-laws were adopted. 
He said that only recently during school hours the teachers 
in a school had collected money for the purpose of trying 
to defeat a certain candidate. Mr. Freifeld told of a secret 
meeting of the Interborough Association held last Thurs- 
day even after the matter had been taken up by the Board. 

" Robert Harrison, Chairman of the Committee on B}^- 
Laws, had a little fun over the remarks that Mr. Stern 
had made, and said that the members of the Board might 
as well resign, and let the teachers run the affairs. After 
several more had spoken, Mr. Stern took occasion to de- 
fend his attitude, and said that the proposed by-law did 
not prevent action by individuals. He thought this point 
was one that ought to be remedied. Gen. Wingate with- 
drew his motion and the matter went over until the next 
meeting." 

The New York Commercial, not, I believe, friendly to 
the women teachers' cause, made this editorial comment, 
November 5, 1908: 

" Opinions will differ as to the propriety of public-school 
teachers engaging actively in politics and especially in 
those political matters which have to do with State and 
municipal legislation on educational affairs. But as to de- 
fining such political activity as an offense carrying with 
it a penalty, why, that is a proposition almost too absurd 
for discussion." 

Yet some members of the board of education of New 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 285 

York, annoyed at the electioneering and speech-making by 
Miss Grace C. Strachan, a Brooklyn public-school teacher, 
seriously propose to " put the law " on her and her kind. 
The board's committee on by-laws has just made a report 
advising that nothing be done to Miss Strachan and her 
co-offenders, inasmuch as there is no by-law at present 
prohibiting such political work, but recommending that a 
new by-law be passed that would make it gross miscon- 
duct and insubordination for any member of the teaching 
or supervisory staff to join an organization that under- 
takes to influence educational legislation^ This by-law 
would also forbid opposing or seeking the election of any 
candidate who voted for or against the bill to raise the 
pay of the teachers. The matter went over to the next 
meeting, but not until a warm discussion had been had on 
the proposition. Commissioner Abraham Stern's protest 
was timely and forcible. " Every teacher," he said, " has 
a right to express his or her opinion upon all things re- 
lating to the board of education and you are going too far 
in making it insubordination to exercise that right." Com- 
missioner Wingate [complained that over in Brooklyn a 
committee of public-school teachers went to a certain can- 
didate for public office and said that the thirteen thousand 
teachers of Greater New York would put a boycott on 
him and on his business unless he would pledge himself 
in advance to vote for higher pay for the teachers. " It 
is time that we stopped this sort of thing, this outrage," 
declared the commissioner. By " we " he meant the board 
of education presumably. But what has the board got to 
do with it? The Brooklyn candidate ought to be able to 
handle the matter himself. There is law enough already 
that he can " put on " every member of the teachers' com- 
mittee who threatened him — and he ought to do it. But 
the board can't muzzle the teachers. If they choose to 
make fools of themselves it is nobody's business but their 
own." 

At the following meeting, held on Nov. 11, 1908, the 
committee had modified its resolution to the following: 

"Resolved, that the by-laws of the Board of Education 



286 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

be, and they are, hereby amended by inserting therein a 
new section to be known and designated as section 57A 
with the caption : " Electioneering Prohibited " reading as 
follows : 

" Section 57A. No member of the supervising or teach- 
ing staff shall individually or otherwise, by any means or 
methods, publicly advocate the election or defeat of any 
candidate for public office or instigate or take part in any 
movement to elect or defeat such candidate, by reason of 
such candidate's attitude toward legislation affecting the 
salaries of members of the supervising or teaching staff." 

On this form the By-Law Committee had been a unit, 
but the women teachers succeeded in preventing its adop- 
tion. The vote was 20 to 16 in favor of the amendment, 
but a majority of all the members, that is 24 votes, were 
needed. The following is from the Eagle of Nov. 12, 1908. 

" Robert L. Harrison, the chairman of the committee, in 
moving the adoption of the by-law, conceded that there had 
not been unanimity in the committee when the previous 
proposed by-law was adopted, but that now the committee 
was a tmit. 

" Nathan S. Jonas, who introduced the original motion 
by which the matter came before the committee admitted 
that he had had some unpleasant correspondence since that 
time but he had had no quarrel with any of the teachers, 
nor did he have a preference for the male over the female 
teachers. What he had done was to stop insubordination 
in the system. He felt that the board of superintendents 
in charge of the teaching staff should have enforced dis- 
cipline. He wanted to make his position clear. In the 
future he would endeavor to hold the superintendents re- 
sponsible for the discipline among the teachers. 

" Hugo Kanzler hoped the by-law would not be adopted, 
because he did not want to abridge the freedom of speech. 
He agreed that during the recent election the action of 
some teachers was highly improper, and he was so im- 
pressed with the dignity of the office of teacher that he did 
not want any of them to stand on a par with ward heelers. 
There was no reason, however, to pass any drastic measure. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 287 

which would curtail the right of the teachers to pass an 
opinion, individually or collectively. 

" Mr. Kanzler took the opportunity, too, to reply to the 
attack made on the women teachers by Dr. Parkhurst, 
although he did not mention the clergyman by name. He 
denounced the charge that they were in an unholy con- 
spiracy with the gamblers. The teachers of the city were 
of such a character that they could not nor would they 
form any such conspiracy. He saw no objection to their 
agitating for an increase of salary, if they did not neglect 
their duty in the classroom. It would come pretty close to 
hanging a padlock on the mouths of the teachers and put- 
ting the key in the hands of the Board of Education. He 
wanted American fair play for all. 

" General Wingate protested that the resolution would 
not close the mouths of the teachers. It was intended 
solely to prohibit electioneering, and was confined to that 
prominent evil. They were meeting a great public evil, 
which should be stopped. 

" Samuel B. Donnelly championed the women teachers. 
During the month of October the newspapers had much to 
say about the active participation of the women teachers in 
the campaign, he said, and members of the Board of 
Education had asserted that they had received complaints 
from candidates to the effect that women teachers were 
actively opposing them. The press reports, however, con- 
tained little if any reference to the political activities of 
the men teachers, and the actions of the men teachers were 
not criticised in the meetings of the board. It was there- 
fore fair to conclude, said he, that the restrictive by-law 
was aimed directly at the women teachers only. There was 
antagonism between members of the board and the women 
teachers and between men and women teachers, and Mr. 
Donnelly asserted that the responsibility of this antagonism 
rested principally with the men. The speeches of the 
leaders of the men teachers and the circulars which had 
been issued by them were indicative of a spirit that merited 
condemnation by the members of the board. In his 
opinion the proposed by-law was improper, arid in opposi- 



288 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

tion to the state constitution. The board should take steps 
to harmonize the differences between the men and women, 
and should do nothing to aggravate the situation. 

" John C. Kelley wanted to be put on record as being 
opposed to the resolution. The proposed by-law was 
opposed to the right of free speech, which was guaranteed 
to every free American. If the same things of which the 
complaint was made had been done by men nothing would 
have been said or done. If the women were doing their 
duty in the schools properly and fittingly, then it was all that 
the board should require of them. 

" Abraham Stern defended the resolution and proposed 
by-law. There was nothing in it to prevent free speeech ; 
there was nothing in it to prevent the teachers signing any 
petition in behalf of any principle. Every constitutional 
right was retained, but it would prevent electioneering and 
would uphold the dignity of the profession of teaching, and 
the majority of the teachers would be in favor of it. He did 
not think there would ever be any occasion when the by-law 
would have to be enforced. It was done for the protection 
of the women teachers themselves. 

" Men who voted for and against the resolution. 

" Yeas — Messrs. Barrett, Bruce, Coudert, Delaney, 
Dresser, Freifeld, Greene, Haase, Harrington, Higgins, 
Ingalls, Jonas, Man, May, Schaedle, A. Stern, C. J. Sulli- 
van, Suydam, Wingate, Winthrop. — 20. 

" Nays — Messrs. Aldcroft, Cosgrove, Cunnion, Donnelly, 
Ferris, Haupt, Hallick, Kanzler, Katzenberg, Kelley, Mc- 
Donald, O'Donohue, Partridge, M. S. Stern, M. J. Sullivan. 
—16." 

On the vote on this proposed by-law the New York 
Commercial said in an editorial, Nov. 13, 1908: 

" It is almost unbelievable, but it is nevertheless true, 
that twenty members of the New York board of educa- 
tion have by formal ballot registered their approval of a 
proposition to put gags in the mouths of the public-school 
teachers, to withdraw from them the right of free-born 
American citizens to express their personal opinions. The 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 289 

matter came up in the form of a motion made at the last 
board meeting to amend the by-laws by the adoption of a 
section forbidding teachers to take part in movements 
seeking the defeat or the election of any candidate for 
public ofifice because of that candidate's attitude toward 
legislation for fixing teachers' salaries. The proposal was 
aimed, as everybody in and out of the board knows, at 
those women teachers who have organized for the pur- 
pose of securing the passage of a law increasing the sal- 
aries of women teachers in this city.* As to the proprie- 
ties or the good taste involved in all this there is a ques- 
tion, of course. Some people may approve it, others may 
condemn it, and others still may hold no opinions on the 
subject. It all depends on circumstances and the point of 
view. But to seriously attempt to stop it by a board-of- 
education-by-law, violation of which would furnish ground 
for the making of charges that might cost a teacher his 
or her position, is preposterous. It is on all fours with a 
proposition for the adoption of an ordinance forbidding 
holders of municipal office to vote in city elections or to 
join political clubs or other political organizations. It 
reeks with intolerance and narrow mindedness. It is un- 
thinkable. Yet only one more vote in the board of education 
would have carried this proposition through. Most mem- 
bers of the board of education very naturally and prop- 
erly resent the action of those women teachers who seek 
to go over the board's head for the regulation of salaries 
by law — a matter strictly within the board's jurisdiction and 
control — but to take any official notice of it at all is beneath 
the dignity of a school commissioner. Give the public 
school teachers all the tongue latitude and all the rope they 
want — they will gag themselves or hang themselves in good 
time without the aid of by-laws." 

A similar policy is indicated in the following extract 
from the Sun of October 17, 1908: 

* The Commercial is mistaken in the purpose of our organiza- 
tion, which is to establish the principle of one salary for one and 
the same position regardless of the sex of the incumbent. 



290 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" Mr. Robinson gave out copies of a letter he had writ- 
ten to Wilham H. Maxwell, Superintendent of Schools, in 
which he said : 

" Referring to your conversation with me over the tele- 
phone to-day in which you stated that you considered our 
action in having invited Miss Grace C. Strachan to address 
the budget was improper, I beg to say that the matter of 
the teachers' salaries and of the entire school budget is 
one in which the taxpayers of the city are vitally interested. 

" We want to know both sides of the question and we 
propose to seek every means in our power to ascertain 
what the truth is. If Miss Strachan is able to present any 
reasons why such increase should properly be made we have 
the right to know what these reasons are. I feel very 
strongly, therefore, that your attitude in condemning us 
for asking her to address the meeting to-morrow is very 
extraordinary." 

The Call of November 12, 1908, contained an article 
which read: 

" In connection with the reported attempt of the Board 
of Education of New York City to throttle the public 
school teachers, it occurs to me that there is much more to 
be considered than the rights of the teachers, important 
as these rights are. 

" Unless our teachers have initiative, individuality and 
culture, they cannot impart these qualities to the children. 
Since in many if not in the majority of cases the chil- 
dren's parents, victims themselves of the present unjust 
economic conditions, have not and therefore cannot impart 
these qualities, the importance of having teachers who 
can do so is at once obvious and overwhelming. 

" If culture, as Bosanquet says, is ' A habit of mind in- 
stinct with purpose, cognizant of a connection and a tend- 
ency in human achievement, able and interested in dis- 
cerning the great from the trivial,' and if, as Professor 
Zeublin says, ' Our culture cannot stand up face to face 
with contemporary problems, it is a contemptible culture,' 
then indeed must we realize how important it is that our 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 291 

teachers should have every possible stimulus to its de- 
velopment. What greater stimulus can there be than that 
afforded by the opportunity for the teachers to become a 
positive element not only for the betterment of their own 
condition through their organized political effort, but in- 
directly, as a consequence of this, the elevation, morally, 
mentally, physically and politically of the public at large? 

" Does the Board of Education think that its undemo- 
cratic assaults upon the freedom of speech and action of 
the teachers will encourage people of character and con- 
viction to enter the profession? Do they wish to inflict 
upon this community, instead of sturdy educators with the 
character and individuality, a generation of pedagogic jelly- 
fish, sans culture, sans character, sans individuality, and 
sans brains. If so, let it pursue, its high-handed policy of 
Russianizing our educational system. 

" I should like to see my own children become fine and 
useful and self-respecting educators of the coming gen- 
erations, but if they must abdicate their intellectual and 
moral sovereignty, then it were better that they should 
take their chances in the fratricidal struggle called private 
capitalism, bad as it is. 

" School teachers of New York, do you intend to be 
men and women or mollvcoddles and mollusks. 

"W. W. Passage. 

"411 Adelphi St., Brooklyn, Nov. 7." 

And a friend wrote : 

" I am no encourager of ' insubordination,' if such there 
be anywhere, in the course pursued by certain ' teachers ' 
in New York City, in the recent State Election politics. 
But I am quite clear in my own mind that converting 
' teachers ' into helots will not help them make their boys 
and girls into free, self-reliant, independent and tolerant 
American :citizens. I am personally a great admirer of 
both Governor Hughes and Superintendent Maxwell. I 
hoped for the election of the former. I consider the latter 
the greatest executive yet produced in American Education, 
and one of the greatest reformers. Nothing, however, that 



292 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

has occurred outside of my own experience has given me 
more genuine personal satisfaction than to see you and 
your associates stand honestly and openly for the rights 
even of teachers to be equal citizens with others in this 
Republic. In other words, I consider that the board of 
education in New York City and its officers are offending 
against the best interests of the democratic nation that is 
to be when they say to the women of New York City 
schools ' Silence : we are the thinkers and the lords,' and 
to the men of the schools, ' Splendid : work all you care 
to as long as you work in line with the powers that are.' 
" Knowing fairly well the historic inferiority of teachers 
and their isolation from ' going ' afiEairs, knowing also the 
present inferiority of women, political and legal, I am 
not surprised at the attitude of the school authorities 
toward the women who do the work of education at direct 
contact with the children and youth. I have long been a 
convinced equal suffragist ; and as such welcome the present 
movement. 

Yours sincerely, 
(Signed) William E. Chancellor, 
Superintendent, Norwalk Union (City) 

School District. 
Nov. II, 1908." 

In connection with all the foregoing, the following letter 
was sent: 

City of New York, November 10, 1908. 
To the Members of the Board of Education : 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers re- 
spectfully submit the following: 

The City Vigilance League of New York, whose officers 
are Charles H. Parkhurst, Honorary President, Frank 
Moss, President; Matthew Beattie, Vice-President; F. W. 
Block, Treasurer, and Thomas L. McClintock, Secretary, 
recently circulated a printed circular letter addressed to 
the ' Female School Teachers of New York City,' which 
contained various misstatements. We quote some extracts, 
and state the facts: 



EQUAL PAY FOk EQUAL WORK 293 

" a. ' Last Friday evening the women teachers held a 
meeting at No. 5 West 125th Street. At that meeting there 
was distributed a circular which advised voting for Mr 
Taft and Mr. Chanler, — showed how it could be done, and 
giving reasons for the doing of it.' 

" No such literature has ever been seen or discussed or 
distributed by the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers. 

" b. ' Women teachers are going among their friends 
. . . and are urging them to vote against Mr. Hughes. 
. . . They say that their instructions are to do this un- 
gracious work very quietly.' 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers has 
never offered or passed any resolution affecting the candi- 
dature of Governor Hughes, nor has the Association given 
instructions to work quietly for any candidate. It is re- 
spectfully submitted that individual members have the same 
rights as other citizens under the Constitution of the United 
States and of the State of New York. 

'"'' c. ' When our women teachers are lending themselves to 
such a movement . . . seeking to obtain votes for the 
ticket for which the gamblers are frantically working; — 
when it is all being done, not for love of gambling and 
gamblers, not for unbridled license ; — but simply for more 
pay . . . they put their argument on the sole ground 
that their pocketbooks would be benefited ; the principles 
involved are overlooked. . . .' 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers is 
organized for the purpose of establishing the principle that 
for 'work of a given position women shall receive equal 
pay with men.' Governor Hughes recognized this in his 
message on the ' Equal Pay Bill ' when he said : * It is 
for this principle the supporters of the bill contend and not 
for mere increased pay.' The association at all public 
hearings has made its position on this point definite and 
clear and it has never sacrificed any other moral principle 
in its efforts to establish this one. 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers be- 
lieves it to be necessary and proper to submit the above 



294 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

statement to your Board because, as your employees, its 
members desire you to know the truth, and also because 
resolutions criticising the women teachers and based wholly 
or partly upon press items and indirect information, have ■ 
been presented and discussed at recent meetings of your 
Honorable Board. During said discussion it has been 
charged that the women teachers were raising a campaign 
fund. 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers has 
never raised any contribution for campaign purposes. 
Neither has it contributed to any campaign fund. Further- 
more, the only request for contributions to a campaign fund 
received by any of its members, so far as it is known by 
this association, came from the Hughes Alliance, and asked 
for a subscription of * $io, or more if possible,' for the 
purpose of aiding in the re-election of Governor Hughes. 

" In conclusion, the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers respectfully submits that it is its intention and 
desire not to violate any by-law of the Board of Education, 
while rehnquishing none of the rights and privileges se- 
cured to all citizens by the Constitution of the United States, 
and that it believes the women teachers are justified in 
looking to the Board of Education to defend them against 
such unwarranted and unjust condemnation. 

" Executive Committee, 
"' Interborough Association of Women Teachers." 

Throughout this controversy so much had been said in 
meetings of the Board and reported in the public press 
about me and my work, that I deemed it due myself and 
my reputation to memorialize the Board with the following 
statement : 

" October 27, 1908. 

" Whereas, at two recent meetings of the Board of Edu- 
cation, held on October 14 and October 28, m.y name was 
used in a formal resolution and in formal discussion in 
such a way as to give my employer and the public ground 
for thinking that I am neglecting my duty as district super- 
intendent of public schools, I respectfully submit the fol- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 295 

lowing report of the work I have done since my assign- 
ment to Districts 33-35 and the commencement of my duties 
in said districts on September 11, 1908: 

" I. Made sixty visits to the nineteen public schools and 
the three evening schools located in these districts. 

"2. Examined ninety-three teachers in their classrooms 
for report on approval of license. 

" 3. Examined eleven teachers in their classrooms for re- 
port on approval of service. 

" 4. Inspected seventy-six classes, meeting teacher in each 
class, in three evening schools. 

"5. Held four formal conferences with principals in of- 
fice of district superintendent after 3 p. m. 

" 6. Attended four meetings of local school boards. 

" 7. Conducted eight formal hearings after 2.30 p. m., in 
suspension cases. 

"8. Conducted thirty-one formal hearings after 3.30 
p. M., in truancy cases. 

" 9. Transferred the whole organization of School No. 
49 to the building occupied by No. 117, as the building of 
the former had to be closed during the process of repairs. 
This action necessitated putting P. S. No. 117 entirely on 
part time, giving the organization of the latter school the 
A. M. session and No. 49 the p. m. session. And 

" 10. Encompassed changes in organization in ten of the 
ten schools in District No. 33, and in six of the nine schools 
in District No. 35. 

"(N. B. — Of the three schools not reorganized, one P. S. 
74 consists of grades of the fifth, seventh, and eighth years 
only, and two— P. S. 75 and P. S. 86 — 'will be the subjects 
of many changes in the near future, due to the opening of 
addition to No. 75.) 

" II. The net results of reorganization already completed 
are: 

''(i) Reduction in number of pupils on part time from 
6560 to 3687 — that is, a decrease of 2893. 

"(2) Increase in number of over-age pupils receiving 
special instruction and care from 959 to 2532 — that is, an 
increase of 1573. 



296 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" These improvements were made possible by : 

"(i) The opening of the addition to P. S. No. 24, giving 
up to date 768 more sittings. The total number of addi- 
tional sittings in both districts, however, is only yT,2, be- 
cause of the decrease of 36 in P. S. 21 by reseating made 
during summer vacation. 

"(2) Changing school district boundaries and transfer- 
ring hundreds of pupils to neighboring schools where there 
were vacant sittings. 

"(3) Rearranging classes in schools so as to make better 
use of sittings. 

" It will be seen that after allowing 1464 as the number 
of part-time pupils placed on full time by the 732 addi- 
tional sittings the number of part-time pupils relieved by 
means of other changes in organization amounts to 1429. 

" In conclusion, I respectfully ask that you protect my 
reputation and usefulness as an employee of the Board of 
Education from unjust attack and undeserved injury." 

This, however, was not the first time that the women 
teachers had incurred the displeasure of the Board, but it 
is noteworthy that not once in the four years' struggle has 
the Board criticised the male teachers. 

The Bronx Star of September 12, 1907, contained the 
following : 

" By adopting a scathing report of a special committee, 
the Board severely rebuked the teachers, who, during the 
agitation for ' equal pay for equal work ' last spring, ab- 
sented themselves from school without permission and went 
to Albany to force through the Legislature their salary bill, 
which Governor Hughes and Mayor McClellan both vetoed, 

" No ' positive disciplinary action, even against the chief 
offenders,' is recommended by the committee in its report. 
It is ' content to call emphatic attention to the inherent im- 
propriety of the acts themselves and to the mischief and 
injury developed in the system by their practice, and to 
sound a fair warning against their repetition.' The com- 
mittee takes this stand * because of the fact that in the past 
absence from school duty • for similar purposes, although 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 297 

never so flagrant as during last winter, was usually passed 
over in silence, and consequently the idea has developed that 
condonation would follow the offense.' 

" To prevent the recurrence of ' a demonstration fraught 
with such large possibilities of evil to the system,' the com- 
mittee recommends certain drastic reforms. These will be 
put into operation as soon as possible, for the Board feels 
that the system must be disciplined. The recommendations 
of the committee are as follows : 

" ' First — That the Committee on By-Laws and Legisla- 
tion be requested to frame immediately more stringent 
rules governing the absence of teachers, principals, super- 
visors and superintendents for causes other than those 
specified in Section 44 of the By-Laws. In the opinion of 
this committee the present deductions are wholly inade- 
quate, and have no deterrent effect. It is recommended 
that a larger portion of the pay of an absentee be deducted. 

" ' Second — That absence without justifiable cause should 
be immediately followed by charges of neglect of duty or 
insubordination to be preferred against the offender by 
the City Superintendent or other proper supervising officer 
or member of the Board of Education. Such action is ear- 
nestly recommended, but to abridge the constitutional right 
of petition, which is abundantly secured, but to preserve 
the integrity of an equally important institution, known as 
the public school system, from the effects of disorder and 
demoralization, if not disruption, at the hands of agitators.' 

" District Superintendent Grace C. Strachan, who man- 
aged the teachers' campaign, and Mrs. Nora Curtis Leni- 
hen, and Miss Isabella Ennis, president and secretary of 
the Interborough Association of Women Teachers, which 
backed the salary bill, are severely critcised in the com- 
mittee's report, as follows: 

" ' There are instances of neglect of duty which call for 
special mention, Miss Grace C. Strachan is a district su- 
perintendent in receipt of a salary of $5,000 per annum 
from the city. Her absences, as reported, aggregate thirty- 
four days. The place she holds and the duties she is called 
upon to discharge are especially important and delicate and 



298 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

preclude the possibility of performance by a clerk, nor can 
neglect of them be cured by " over-time." She is the offi- 
cial supervisor of twenty-two principals and about 700 
teachers, all of whom are under her supervision, and they 
have a right to assume that she is moved by the highest 
ideals of fidelity to duty. 

" ' Her official report of her absences, containing the 
reasons for the same, reads as follows : "" Work in a cause 
destined to uplift the moral standards of the school system, 
and hence of the community, the State, the nation, and the 
zuorld — the establishment of justice for the women work- 
ers in our public schools." She was so engaged during 
fully one-fifth of the school year, and during that time 
she rendered but little, if any, service in supervision of the 
schools, teachers and scholars in her district, for which 
part service she drew her salary in full. 

" ' Mrs. N. Curtis Lenihen admits an absence of twenty- 
nine days since January i, 1907, and Miss Isabella Ennis 
admits eleven and one-half days. Neither deigns to assign 
any cause for the same. Both are the recipients of ample 
salaries from the city and the system, against whose inter- 
ests they persistently agitated for legislation that was noto- 
riously unjust to a large number of teachers.' 

" The number of days of absence acknowledged to have 
been spent in Albany by various members of the teaching 
and supervising staff exceeds 500," the report continues. 
" This equals an absence for a single teacher of over two 
and a half school years. It also appears that upward of 
300 of the supervisors, principals and teachers were thus 
actively engaged." By these absences, in the opinion of 
the committee, " the service was demoralized." 

The average reader of the foregoing report would form 
the conclusion that there was wholesale neglect of duty by 
the women teachers. As a matter of fact, it was rarely 
that more than one teacher was absent from any one school 
at the same time for the purpose of " going to Albany." 
It must be remembered that there were then 511 public 
schools. There were only two occasions when large dele- 
gations of women teachers went to Albany. The first of 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 299 

these was the hearing on the McCarren bill before the 
Senate Cities Committee, and the second, the hearing on 
the Conklin bill before the Assembly Cities Committee. 
Most of the schools sent delegates. With only one from 
each school, it will be seen the total would have been over 
500. It must be remembered also that every teacher so 
absent lost her day's pay, and was expected to supply a 
substitute. 

In my own behalf, I sent the following communication 
to the Board: 

" To the Board of Education: 

" Sirs — Before adopting any by-law which is the out- 
come of the report presented last month by your special 
committee on absences, and approved by your Honorable 
Body, I respectfully request that you reconsider said re- 
port for the purpose of correcting it. I am not willing to 
believe that your Honorable Body would knowingly permit 
a false or even misleading statement to become a perma- 
nent part of your records. While there are several parts 
of said report which in the interests of justice and fair 
play are susceptible of alteration, I ask for the correction 
of only one part, to wit: that which in efifect states that 
my absence of thirty-four days constitutes an absence of 
one-fifth of a school year. To begin with, thirty-four is 
one-fifth of only 170. During the past school year, the 
day schools were in session 193 days. Therefore, even in 
the case of a teacher whose duty required her to be present 
during only those 193 sessions, a statement that an absence 
of 34 days constitutes an absence of one-fifth of a school 
year, is manifestly incorrect. But in the case of a district 
superintendent, the incorrectness of such a statement is 
far greater. 

" As district superintendent, I was on duty not only dur- 
ing the 193 days that the day schools were in session, but 
also during the 120 nights that the night schools were in 
session, and the 48 days that the Vacation Playgrounds 
were in session, and the 30 days that the Vacation Schools 
were in session, and also during the hours between 3.30 



300 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

p. M. and 5 p. m. on Mondays and Wednesdays and 9 a, m. 
and II A. M. on Saturdays that the City Superintendent 
has assigned as office hours, and also during the hours of 
the day and the night that the Local School Board of my 
districts were in session, and also during the many hours 
before 9 a. m. and after 3 p. m. when I was in conference 
at my home and office and the Hall of Education with 
parents, principals, superintendents and teachers, and also 
during the many hours on Sundays and holidays which I 
have devoted to my work as district superintendent. In 
connection with the above, I respectfully submit that on 
July I, 1907, I informed the City Superintendent that I 
wanted to be absent fifteen days for the purpose of attend- 
ing the Annual Convention of the National Educational 
Association at Los Angeles, Cahfornia, On the ground 
that I was on duty in connection with the Vacation Schools 
and Playgrounds, the City Superintendent refused to per- 
mit such absence. And although I pointed out that the 
Vacation Schools would not open until July 8, 1907, and 
would be in session until late in August, and that there- 
fore I would have time to inspect the schools assigned to 
me after my return, the desired approval was withheld. 
Furthermore, during the eight summers since my election 
as district superintendent I have been on duty part of 
July and August. From the foregoing it is evident that 
any statement to the effect that an absence of 34 days in 
one year on the part of a district superintendent constitutes 
an absence of one-fifth of a year, is manifestly incorrect 
and unjust. 

" I am now serving my fifteenth year in the public 
schools of the City of New York. Never once have I been 
absent for trivial or selfish reasons. Personal illness or 
illness and death in my immediate family, with but one ex- 
ception that I can recall, have been the only causes of ab- 
sence on my part prior to January i, 1907. The records 
of this department will show that I have never received 
one cent refund on account of absence. It is true that 
during some of my absences my salary has been paid in 
full^ but my case in this respect is not unique. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 301 

" The report referred to in this communication, also re- 
ferred to a previous prolonged absence on my part. It is 
true that from October 6, 1904, to February 19, 1905, I 
was a hospital patient with a broken arm. During all that 
time, though submitting to an anesthetic thirty-two times, 
and suffering almost constant and agonizing pain, I was in 
daily touch with my office and the affairs in my twenty- 
one schools. Principals, teachers and parents came to the 
hospital to confer with me. Miss de Buck or some other 
clerk brought me the mail and other matter from my 
office. I dictated letters and reports and signed thousands 
of requisitions, reports, and other official documents. The 
Committee on Supplies, learning of the pain and difficulty 
under which I was laboring, very kindly passed a resolu- 
tion permitting my stamped signature to take the place of 
my personal signature on requisitions. Therefore, refer- 
ence to this absence, in the report of Mr. Jonas's Commit- 
tee, seems ungracious, if not unfair. 

" In conclusion, I pray your Honorable Body to recon- 
sider the report. 

"Very respectfully yours, 

"Grace C, Strachan." 

The latest action of the Board in connection with our 
going to Albany is told thus by the Herald of April 29, 
1909: 

" The question came up as to whether permission should 
be granted to Miss Grace Strachan, district superintendent, 
and seven women teachers to be absent from school and 
go to Albany to hear the decision of the Legislature in 
regard to the Teachers' Equal Pay Bill the latter part of 
the week. 

" Abraham Stern, chairman of the Committee on Ele- 
mentary Schools, said: 

" * The teachers want to go to Albany to buttonhole the 
members of the Legislature and this Board should not 
allow any lobbying by school teachers.' 

" Joseph E. Cosgrove defended the women. * The 
trouble with this Board is that more sentiment is needed. 



302 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

What is eight teachers out of 16,000? I think the Board 
shows narrow mindedness if it denies their request. And 
I think it highly improper to characterize these women 
teachers as " lobbyists " and to say that they want to go 
to Albany to " buttonhole " members of the Legislature.' 

" Thomas J. Higgins, chairman of the Committee on 
the Care of Buildings, said there has been too much senti- 
ment shown by the Board to the teachers and that the re- 
quest should not be granted. Alrick H, Man declared the 
teachers who absent themselves to go to Albany should 
be fined, and George Freifeld said: 

" ' The attitude of the women teachers is a sordid striv- 
ing after more money.' 

" Nicholas J. Barrett, chairman of the Committee on 
Supplies, said that no courtesy could be shown to Miss 
Strachan, * who, though she is the highest salaried district 
superintendent, does not seem to have much to do, but 
can go to Albany while the other district superintendents 
are kept busy all of the time.' " 

The following day, the Gledhill-Foley bill passed the 
Assembly with a vote of 126 to 14, and during the dis- 
cussion Charles F. Murphy, though voting " No," said : 

" I sympathize with this great body of our public serv- 
ants who are forbid to present to our committees in this 
House their views upon this bill. They should have the 
same rights which are accorded to the corporation of the 
City of New York, the Public Service Commission, the 
railroad interests, the telephone interests, the Charter Re- 
vision Commission and all other interests, whether public 
or private. 

" I desire to take off my hat and pay my respects to 
that band of masterly women who have for the past few 
years been fighting the battle which they consider just and 
right. The women teaching the lower grades are work- 
ing for woefully insufficient compensation, and they are 
leading clean and wholesome lives under adverse circum- 
stances. I know many of them who are working for six 
or seven hundred dollars a year and endeavoring to repay 
a serious indebtedness incurred in securing their education. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 303 

" The chivalric spirit of man cannot but be inspired by 
the plucky battle which is being waged. I have not op- 
posed these bills for political effect, and I deprecate the 
cheap politics of candidates for office who will arrange a 
plant or mill in public meetings so that an issue may be 
raised for campaign purposes against women who have no 
forum in which they may make an effective defense of 
their principle." 

He was frequently applauded. 

On November 12, 1908. I sent the following letter to the 
Eagle, after a personal interview with Hon. St. Clair Mc- 
Kelway, editor, about the editorial and news article re- 
ferred to in my letter, and after securing a promise from 
him that my reply would be given the same prominence as 
the articles to which it referred. The promise was not 
kept, though the letter was published : 

"To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

" Many of the women teachers who read your recent 
editorial on ' Should Keep Out of Politics ' and the news 
article entitled ' Women Teachers' Aid Hoodoo to Candi- 
dates ' ask that you show your good will toward all your 
readers by setting before them in unprejudiced statements 
both sides of the argument. And they ask particularly 
now that you publish this letter in full and give it as con- 
spicuous position as was accorded the articles above re- 
ferred to. 

" These articles stated that Senator Travis received in 
the recent election a plurality of 4,015 votes, as compared 
with 1,636 two years ago, and implied that this increase 
is due solely to the opposition of the women teachers. 

" In this connection we call attention to the fact that 
two years ago Chanler, as Democratic candidate for lieu- 
tenant-governor, carried Kings County by over 25,000, 
while this year Taft, as Republican candidate for Presi- 
dent, carried it by 23,085. How does the Eagle explain 
the fact that Senator Travis, a Republican, ran 2,564 be- 
hind Taft in his own district? 

" The Eagle of November 4 said, ' Harman (Travis' 



304 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

opponent) made a remarkable run. Harman ran ahead of 
Bryan 2,564.' 

"The Standard-Union (Rep.) of same date gave Har- 
man 2,692 more than Bryan. Harman had declared him- 
self in favor of the women teachers. 

" From Senator Travis, who opposed the women teach- 
ears, let us turn and consider the case of Assemblyman 
Conklin (Rep.), who introduced the Equal Pay Bill in the 
Assembly both in 1906 and 1907. The Globe says : ' This 
year the women- made a stronger fight than ever before in 
favor of Conklin.' He received last year a plurality of 334. 
This year he was re-elected by 1,719— -five times his plu- 
rality of 1906. 

"What is the conclusion here? Did the aid of the 
women teachers prove a hoodoo to Mr. Conklin ? He again 
leads all the local candidates in his district, as he did last 
year. 

" The case of still another friend of women teachers is 
that of Senator White — the father of the ' White ' Equal 
Pay Bill, As a candidate for lieutenant-governor on the 
Republican ticket he carried Brooklyn by 4,777, although 
Chanler as candidate for governor on the Democratic ticket 
carried this borough by 4,368— a difference of 9,145 in fa- 
vor of Senator White. 

" AVe hold that it would be just as reasonable to claim 
that Senator's White's lead was due to the assistance of 
the women teachers as to claim that the lead of Senator 
Travis was due to the opposition of the women teachers. 
The Globe says : ' No doubt the active support of the 
women was a great help to him ' (Senator White). 

" The Eagle's figures also show that though Lee, Mur- 
phy and Colne, all opponents of the women teachers' bill, 
have increased pluralities this year, they ran behind the 
head of their ticket by 945, 812, and 963, respectively. 
Although Taft carried Kings County by 23,085, Green's 
(Rep.) plurality dropped from 2,287 i'^ 1906; Chanler 
(Dem.) carrying Brooklyn by about 25,000, to 1,071 in 
1907 and 927 in 1908. He ran 670 behind Taft. DeGroot 
(Rep.), also an opponent of the women teachers, ran 1,071 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 305 

behind the head of his ticket. These figures are significant 
when it is considered that other Republicans, who did not 
antagonize the women teachers, ran well along with their 
tickets — Weber and SurplesS; for instance, running only 
57 and 71, respectively, behind Taft. 

"Another Assemblyman, George V. Sheridan (Dem.), 
Bronx, who has been conspicuous as an opponent of the 
women teachers, suffered a decrease in his plurality from 
1,122 in 1907 to 786 in 1908, though his Republican oppo- 
nent had come out openly in favor of the women teachers." 

Sheridan was defeated 'in 1909. — G. C. S. 

Mr. Brady's letter on same editorial is interesting: 

" To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

" As an old reader of your valuable paper and one of 
the many thankful for the stand you took for Taft and 
Hughes, I was somewhat surprised to read your editorial 
in last evening's edition, under the heading, * Should Keep 
Out of Politics.' You give several sets of figures, show- 
ing the probable effect of the school teachers' opposition, 
which, on examination, prove exceedingly misleading and 
show an erroneous conclusion. 

" If your statement that ' the opposition of the Inter- 
borough Teachers' Association will soon equal in value the 
indorsement of one of the minor parties' is true, how do 
you accotmt for the showing of candidates for re-election 
in whose Assembly districts no organized effort was made 
at all by the teachers? For instance, Charles G. Weber, 
in the Fifth Assembly District (who, by the way, voted 
for the teachers' bill)^ ran behind Mr. Taft, the proper 
candidate to use as a standard for comparison, only 57 
votes, and Thomas J. Surpless, in the Sixth Assembly Dis- 
trict (who voted against the teachers' bill), ran but 71 be- 
hind Mr. Taft. Senator Travis, in his district, ran 1,567 
behind Mr. Taft, and Messrs. Lee, DeGroot, Colne, Mur- 
phy and Green ran, respectively, 945, 1,071, 963, 812 and 
670 behind Taft. 

" From the foregoing comparative figures Messrs. 



3o6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Weber and Surpless, with no opposition from the teachers, 
made a much better showing than any of the other candi- 
dates whom you mention as being opposed by the teachers ; 
so that, on your own basis of computation, the teachers' 
opposition must be deemed effective. . . . 

" Harry J. Brady. 
"426 De Kalb Avenue, November 7, 1908." 

Two other correspondents who resent suggestion that 
women instructors attend to their knitting: 

" To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

" On November 6, in an editorial supporting the thesis 
that women teachers should keep out of politics, you named 
a number of instances in which local candidates, opposed 
by the women, were elected by increased pluralities, and 
you somewhat plainly implied that such increases showed 
added strength as a result of the teachers' opposition. 

" Brooklynites are proud of the willingness with which 
the Eagle is accustomed to present both sides of a ques- 
tion, I am relying on that willingness in asking you to 
give publicity to one or two facts which seemed to have 
been overlooked by the writer of the article referred to. 

" A local candidate's strength is probably shown quite 
as clearly by the comparison which his plurality bears to 
that of the head of his ticket as it is by a comparison of 
his plurality at one election with that at another. In the 
Sixth Senate District, according to the revised city vote 
published on November 4, Mr. Taft received a plurality of 
6,579, ^s against Mr. Travis' plurality of 4,015. In the 
same district, Mr. Harman ran 1,300 votes ahead of Mr. 
Bryan. In the Eighteenth Assembly District, Mr. Taft's 
plurality was 5,304, Mr. Lee's 3,759. Here Mr. McGann 
ran 425 votes ahead of Mr. Bryan. In the Fourth Assem- 
bly District in Queens, Mr. Taft had a plurality of 2,625 ; 
Mr. DeGroot of 1,554, while Mr. Robinson ran 500 votes 
ahead of Mr. Bryan. 

"Though the Taft 'landslide' could not keep the plu- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 307 

ralities of the local Republican candidates in question up 
to those of the head of their ticket, it would hardly be 
unfair to assume that it had somewhat more to do with 
their increased pluralities than had the opposition of the 
women teachers. It would hardly be unfair to believe that 
one of the factors which helped these gentlemen's oppo- 
nents to run ahead of their tickets was the support of the 
women. 

" Whether the teachers' recent political activity was wise 
or otherwise, justice would seem to demand a considera- 
tion of all the facts of the case in an impartial discussion 
of its bearing on election issues. Justice might even sug- 
gest a reference to the fact that such activity was quite 
undoubtedly a factor in the success of the candidates for 
whom it was most employed. I refer, of course, to Mr. 
Conklin of the Twenty-first Assembly District, Manhattan, 
and to the present Lieutenant-Governor-elect, Horace 
White. 

" A Friend of the Women Teachers. 

" Brooklyn, Nov. 7, 1908." 

Anent the same election, the New York Globe said: 

" It is in the minor contests that the influence of the 
teachers is more likely to be felt. The men teachers pre- 
sented united, determined and ceaseless opposition to the 
re-election of Assemblyman Conklin. Last year he re- 
ceived a plurality of only 400. This year the women made 
a stronger fight than ever before in support of Conklin, 
and he was re-elected by over four 'times this plurality, or 
1,719. In the same district White received a plurality of 
1,765, and Hughes only 1,585. 

" As White and Conklin were the particular objects of 
attack of the men who were repeatedly to ' kill White and 
bury Conklin,' the women teachers feel that they have won 
a great victory in the election of two of the chief advo- 
cates of ' Equal Pay.' 

" John Harman, who was supported by the women, 
' made a remarkable run,' according to the Brooklyn Eagle, 



3o8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

which adds that ' the number of Republican ballots split 
in favor of Harman varied from lo to 30 in the different 
election districts.' 

" There are two facts, however, which confuse calcu- 
lations in this district. The men teachers also favored 
Hughes and opposed White, but Hughes received only 
2,510 plurality, while White got 3,565." 

After the election of 1907, the Eagle printed an article 
along the same lines. I wrote to the men whom' they de- 
scribed as having suffered on account of their allegiance to 
the women teachers. Following is a characteristic reply: 

" Albany, April 10, 1908. 
"My Dear Miss Strachan: 

" Replying to your letter in regard to the statement re- 
cently published that my action in connection with my vote 
on the Equal Pay bill had cost me a thousand votes or 
more, I do not hesitate to say that the statement is abso- 
lutely false. The reduction in vote was due entirely to 
local conditions. The first year I ran I had the endorse- 
ment of the Independence League and my name was on 
two tickets. This year the Independence League endorsed 
my opponent and his name was on two tickets. The num- 
ber of votes influenced for or against me by the male 
teachers . . . amounts to zero. 

" Yours sincerely, 

'' James J. Hoey." 

It had been clear throughout that the animus of all those 
who attacked the women teachers for political activity in 
this gubernatorial campaign was the fact that they be- 
lieved the women teachers were working against Governor 
Hughes. Proof of this is shown by the fact that not one 
reference was made by them, to the pernicious activity of 
the men teachers. I use the word " pernicious " deliber- 
ately, because I believe their literature distributed during 
this same period, copies of which appear below, justifies its 
use. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 309 

" Men Teachers' and Principals' Association 
OF THE City of New York. 

"'To all Delegates, 
" Gentlemen : 

" Lest there be some man in your school who is not 
apprised of the exact situation, we ask that you circulate 
this notice among all men in your school, including the 
Principal. 

" Governor Hughes vetoed the ' Equal Pay ' Bill. Your 
association stands pledged to support him to a man in his 
race for the Governorship. You certainly must all know 
that but for his courageous veto the bill would have become 
a law, and every young man in the system would have 
suffered a decrease in his maximum ; and all men have lost 
forever any possibility of increase. 

" The least you can do is to 

"VOTE for HUGHES 

irrespective of party affiliation. 

" Urge this upon all your friends now and on Election 
Day. You men can do a lot if you try! 

" Senator White, who fathered the ' Equal Pay ' Bill in 
the Senate, is running for Lieutenant-Governor on the Re- 
publican ticket. 

"VOTE AGAINST WHITE." 

The following appeared in the Brooklyn Eagle,- October 
28, 1908: 

" As you probably know, the association is making its 
crucial fight against Conklin in the Twenty-first Assembly 
District. We have laid our plans carefully and now need 
men, good men, to aid in a whirlwind campaign. Your 
school has always ranked as one which I do not hesitate to 
count on. We need every man in your school for every 
afternoon and evening, beginning Monday evening, the 
26th, only until election. There is quiet, dignified work for 
each, according to his tastes. 

" It is vitally important to beat this man. To those in- 



310 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

clined to hesitate let me say that it is better to be vigorously 
aggressive now and by beating Conklin, end it all, than to 
let this dissension drag along in the schools, ruining the 
efficiency of the service, sapping the energies of the teachers 
and dragging the schools back into politics and all that that 
entails. 

" Let us be men, courageous and far-seeing, believing 
that in the end all will see that we have served the schools 
more than ourselves in this fight. 

" Will you to-day urge upon your men ready response 
to this call. I want every available man to meet me at the 
Shenandoah Club, 2305 Seventh Avenue, New York, on 
Monday evening. If they cannot come Monday evening, 
then at their first opportunity. I shall be there continually 
until election. Take Subway to One Hundred and Thirty- 
fifth Street; walk west to Seventh Avenue and around the 
corner. Send me, in the enclosed envelope, a list of the 
men in your school who will come forward, the days and 
evenings they can give and their residences. 

" We are all working very hard for the interests of all. 
Will you help us ? " 

Two copies of a paper called " The New York School 
Master" were distributed. The matter they contained ap- 
pears below : 

"THE NEW YORK SCHOOL MASTER 
More culture and more men in the schools. 



Vol, I Brooklyn, N. Y., October 20, 1908. No. 3. 

VOTE FOR HUGHES! 

Republican Candidate for Governor 

Because : — 

Governor Hughes saved every young man $525 on his 
maximum salarv by his veto of the White ("Equal Pay") 
Bill. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 311 

Governor Hughes saved every man his chance of ulti- 
mate increase in salary. Had the " Equal Pay " Bill be- 
come a law, the necessity of raising ten women's salary to 
every man's increased, would have forever precluded the 
possibility of any increase. 

Governor Hughes will lose a few votes because he vetoed 
the White Bill. WE MEN should respect his manly stand 
for what he considered his duty, and irrespective of party 
affiliation, cast our votes for Hughes. An American Execu- 
tive should be encouraged to fearlessly perform his duty, 
irrespective of the interests he may injure. 

It is reported that Mr. Chanler if elected Governor, will 
favor an "Equal Pay" Bill. Can YOU support your 
FAMILY on a woman's salary. 

VOTE FOR DEGROOT. 

Candidate for Assembly in Queens. 

His action, last session, as a member of The Assembly's 
Cities' Committee, AGAINST the " Equal Pay " Bill, has 
marked him for defeat by the Interboroughites (to say 
women teachers would be too comprehensive). 

Page 2. 

VOTE AND WORK AGAINST CONKLIN, Republican 
candidate for Assembly in the 21st Assembly District. 

BECAUSE:— 

He has insulted every MAN in the schools, in public de- 
bate and in private conversation. 

He introduced The " Equal Pay " Bill in the Assembly, 
which would have lowered every young man's maximum by 
$525 ; and which would have forever prevented any man's 
schedule being increased. 

He believes that men should not be employed as teachers. 
He thinks them out of place in the schools — elementary 
especially. 

A vigorous campaign is being waged against this man. 
If you live in his district or are willing to work against 



312 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

him, send your name to Austin H. Evans, 44 West 128th 
St., Manhattan. 

VOTE AGAINST WHITE— Republican candidate for 

Lieutenant-Governor. 
Because, 

He is a scheming poHtician of the worst order, entirely 
antagonistic to every reform Governor Hughes has at- 
tempted to inaugurate. 

He put through the Senate the White ("Equal Pay") 
Bill, which swept away every safeguard provided by The 
Davis Law, thereby willfully seeking to throw the schools 
back into politics. 

VOTE FOR TRAVIS. 

He made a cogent argument in the Senate against Miss 
Strachan's unjust bill. Was, in consequence, upbraided by 
her in the press. On Thursday she ordered her association 
to defeat him. 

Page 3. 

Published Monthly by 

The Association of Men Teachers 

and Principals of the City of 

New York. 

Under the direction of the 

Press Committee. 

Bernard Cronson, Ex-Officio. 

James J. Sheppard John L. Hulshof 

Charles O. Dewey Roy L. Richardson. 

Esle F. Randolph Chas. H. Davis 

Edgar S. Shumway F. E. Odell 

John Liebermann D. D. Wallstein 

Frederick H. Paine Hadley C. Case 

R. P. Ellis, Chairman, 

E. 49th St., Mill Lane, Brooklyn. 

Wm. E. Barhite, Secretary. 
Address all communications to the Chairman. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 313 

Editor's note: — 

Numerous letters have been received by the Editor, re- 
questing that a list of Assemblymen and Senators who 
voted for the " Equal Pay " Bill be published. Inasmuch 
as the sentiment in favor of " equal pay " is waning greatly, 
the Editor suggests that each man visit his Assemblyman 
and Senator, and their opponents if possible, and ascertain 
how they intend to stand this year. Many changes will be 
found. 

Here is a task for every man in the system. As soon as 
a candidate has declared himself for or against us, we shall 
be very glad to be apprised immediately of the fact, and 
due publicity will be given. The Schoolmaster will be is- 
sued weekly during the campaign. If you do not get your 
copy, write us at once. 
Our Civic Duties. 

Schoolmen should take an interest in civic affairs. We 
are failing in our duty as representative citizens in the 
community, if we do not evince the same intelligent inter- 
est and participation in the administration of our represen- 
tative form of government that we seek to impress upon 
coming generations as its inalienable heritage and duty. 

This does not mean that we are to become politicians 
or ward heelers. It does mean, however, that you should 
know your representatives in the Assembly, the Senate 
and in Congress, and that they should know you, as a 
teacher living in their district, and as a man who will give 
their actions the close scrutiny they deserve. 

Therefore, make it your business, whatever your party 
affiliations, to meet your present Assemblyman and Sen- 
ator. They can always be found at their political clubs 
over the week-end. Introduce yourself — give them your 
card. And even if you do not discuss questions with them, 
give them occasion to observe that you are about and ex- 
ercising your civic rights." 

Other literature sent out by the male teachers is equally 
illuminating. 



314 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

For example: 
" DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

THE CITY OF NEW YORK 
" The Stuyvesant High School 
" 226 East 23d Street 
"Frank Rollins, Principal, 

" 408 West 150th Street, N. Y. City. 
" October 28, 1907. 
''Dear Sir: 

"Assemblyman Conklin of the 21st Assembly District 
must be defeated or badly scared this fall by men teachers. 
Some are working day and night to do so. Your interest 
last spring encourages us to ask you to help now. Please 
visit evenings, Saturday and Sunday afternoons — before 
election, the Republican voters whose names and addresses 
are on the inclosed list. The names on the back (cross 
marked) are not in your section. Names of known sup- 
porters of Felix are crossed off. You can paste this on 
stiff paper for more convenient use. If you meet with 
other teachers, get them to help. If you can't visit all 
voters — ^the most effective influence — or even if you can, it 
would be well to leave a statement of points for each voter. 
Some lines of attack: 

" I. Property holders and rent payers don't want a man 
who joined with McCarren and White and trying, through 
a reckless political bill, to add from 10 to 13 millions to 
the city budget. 

" 2. Conklin, with Brough of the 19th, alone among Re- 
publican Assemblymen from Manhattan, refused to sup- 
port the Mayor's veto of the White Bill and to uphold 
home rule last spring. 

" 3. To judge from this record, a vote for Conklin is 
not supporting Hughes. 

" 4. A 30-year-old Assemblyman has more ' nerve ' than 
wisdom, to insult the Board of Education as he did in 
several speeches, and is unfair to cast ridicule, for political 
advantage, upon a few men teachers who are facing 500 
women teachers in an Assembly hearing. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



0^3 



" 5. Felix, the Democratic candidate, is a school teacher. 
As a Hebrew, he is influential and a member of the syna- 
gogue. These points for teachers and Hebrews. 

"6. If you can't meet an objection to Tammany, at least 
dissuade from voting for Conklin. Scheppler, the Ind. 
League Candidate, is a leader in the printers' union and 
a strong man — considerations attractive to labor men. 

" Remember, even if you do not change many votes in 
the strong Republican section in which you will work, 
much will be gained for our cause, if you can get a num- 
ber of Republicans to express to Conklin their disapproval 
of his course last spring. 

" Don't fail us. We have a great chance this fall to 
show that we are not a negligible political factor. 
" Yours respectfully, 
(Signed) "Ambrose Cort— Capt. 19th Sen. Dist." 

Mr. Conklin ran ahead of his ticket by over 300. 

" On two dififerent occasions within the space of one 
week, the association made attempts to have a number of 
men teachers meet the candidate for Assembly in the 21st 
Assembly District, who is favorably disposed to us. 

" Both attempts were failures. Impression made upon 
the candidate was not one to inspire political respect for 
the men teachers. 

" Another meeting is called for next Monday, October 
19th, at 4 P. M. at Y. M. C. A., 5 West 125th Street. 

" It is important for the success of the coming campaign 
of your association that you attend, just to show that you 
are once in a while awake to your interests, and that you 
can spare an hour to attend to them yourself, instead of 
by proxies who are themselves absent from the meetings. 

" Come and bring as many friends as possible. 
" Sincerely, 

" Bernard Cronson. 
" Monday, Oct. 19, 4 p. m., Y. M. C. A., 5 West 125th St." 



3i6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Appeals for Money. 

"We, the undersigned, teachers of P. S. No. ..-.., 
Brooklyn, hereby agree to contribute one dollar each per 
month for the months of February, March and April, 
1908, for the" purpose of an educational campaign, the same 
to be applied to dues and assessments in the Association 
of Men Teachers and Principals of the City of New York. 
" Name. Feb'y | March | April 



" May II, 1907. 
" The A_sscciation of Men Teachers and Principals of the 
City of New York 
" Dr. Wm. L. Ettingen, Pres. 
" To the Delegate : 

" The White Bill has been vetoed by the Mayor. This 
means : 

" That an attempt will be made to have the Bill passed 
over His Honor's veto. 

'' That a committee from our Association must proceed 
at once, to Albany and stay there for an indefinite number 
of days. 

" That the committee will incur expenses which the As- 
sociation must meet. 

" That the Association has no endowment fund and no 
money outside of what it receives from the men teachers 
and principals. 

" Conclusion: 

" Please collect from all who have not yet paid their 
membership dues and assessments ; then till out the blank 
sent to you several days ago, and send money and blanks 
to 

" Bernard Cronson, 
" 129 W. 136 St. Man. 

" * A number of schools have already paid up in full 
and sent in blanks. A printed list of members, the amounts 
paid by each and membership cards will be sent at the earli- 
est opportunity." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 317 

" Association of Men Teachers and Principals of the City 
of New York 

" Brooklyn, October 26, 1908. 
"To the Delegates and Men: 

" Gentlemen: It is very important that the dues be 
forthcoming at this time. Will you kindly collect on re- 
ceipt hereof and transmit your report on the enclosed blank 
to the Treasurer, Dr. David H. Holmes, in the enclosed 
envelope. He will issue you a receipt. 

" If it is not convenient to pay all just at this time 
collect all you can and give date of payment of balance in 
the column provided on the blank. 

" We are in the midst of a most aggressive campaign 
and need these funds. To those few who may not favor 
aggressiveness, say that it is better to end this dissension 
now, once for all, than to allow it to drag along sapping 
the energies of teachers, perpeutating lack of harmony and 
ruining the efficiency of the service. 

" Let all men support their organization in this fight. A 
decisive victory means the end of ' equal pay.' Fear not 
to ACT, trusting that in the end all shall see that we have 
labored more for the good of the system than for our- 
selves. 

" Faithfully yours, 

" Bernard Cronson, 

" President. 
" David H. Holmes, 

" Treasurer. 
"Dues, $2. 
" R. P. Ellis, 
" Chairman Press Committee." 

" Principals' Association of the City of New York. 

" April 21, 1910. 
" To the Men Principals of New York City. 

"Gentlemen: At the last meeting of the Principals' 
Association, the members present voted that each male 
principal of the city be requested to contribute five dollars 
to a fund for advancing: the interests of the schools. 



3i8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" This fund is not to be used in defraying the routine 
expenses of the association, but it is intended to satisfy a 
special and very important claim upon the resources of 
every man in the schools. 

" Please send your contribution to Mr. J. J. Driscoll, 
P. S. No. i6, Richmond. 

" Yours very truly, 

" RuFUS A. Vance, 
" Charles B. Jameson, President. 

" Cor. Secretary." 

Editorial, Richmond Hill Re cor d^ Saturday, October 31, 
1908: 

" DeGroot and the Teachers. 

" William A. DeGroot's reply to attacks upon his con- 
duct as a legislator will be found in another column. In 
the course of the week the Record has received many 
letters from its friends among the male school teachers 
asking that this reply be published. 

" Really, the Record must admit that it does not know 
what, at present, is Mr. DeGroot's attitude toward the 
equal pay bill, so called. The Record is not even sure that 
the desire of the male teachers to have Mr. DeGroot's 
reply published indicates that they regard his candidacy 
favorably. 

" But, taking it for granted that the male teachers be- 
lieve the publication of Mr. DeGroot's reply will help and 
not hurt his candidacy, their interest in the matter would 
seem to show that Mr. DeGroot has made his peace with 
those of the school teachers who have votes, and that he 
is, now, opposed to the so-called equal pay bill. 

" Into the merits of that bill the Record will not enter. 
Like all similar bills, it had good and bad features. 

" Some time ago an organization of school teachers — 
the kind that have votes — was formed to bend Mr. De- 
Groot's stubborn will to theirs. Apparently he bent before 
he broke. 

" Some time ago the organization referred to was 




Hon. Horace White, 

Father of "White" "Equal Pay" Bills of 1907 and 1908. 
Lieutenant-Governor of New York, 1909 and 1910. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 319 

formed. It had all sorts of officers and committees. The 
printing was done in this office. The path of the weekly 
newspaper is not bestrewn with roses, and even publishers 
must eat sometimes. It costs money to print long letters, 
but the Record prints Mr. DeGroot's willingly. One of 
the members of the teachers' organization who did not 
communicate with this office was the treasurer. We would 
be pleased to have him do so. 
" There's a reason." 

Richmond Hill Record, October 3, 1908: 

" Male Teachers Are Angry. 

"So Is the Record, with Much Greater Reason. 
"Conspiracy, did you say? Oh, worse! Simply awful! 
A dozen letters have been received at the Record office 
during the week, of which the following is a fair sample. 
Strange as it may seem, all are from male school teachers, 
and each has some grievance as a pretext for the letter 
and each winds up with the same comment on Mr. De- 
Groot in almost exactly the same words. Some remarked, 

* Not for publication,' so the names of the writers will not 
be given. 

" Last year was organized the Male Teachers' Associa- 
tion and had ' captains ' in every district. The Record did 
some printing for the association, and even at this late 
date would not object to something other than far-fetched 

* grievances.' 

" Last year DeGroot was not quite sure about his vote 
on the equal pay bill for school teachers. This year Rob- 
inson, the Democratic candidate, has declared himself in 
favor of the women. Do the letters to the Record indicate 
that DeGroot has made promises to the men? 

" As for the charges of the unfairness of the Record, 
they are twaddle. The columns of this paper are always 
open to both sides on any question. This week Mr. De- 
Groot takes up more than his share of space, all of which 
was arranged for before these indignant school teachers 
got their heads together. 



320 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" Here is the complaint : 

"'Editor Richmond Hill Record. 

" ' Dear Sir : About a year ago I was disgusted with 
your estimate of local real estate values — encouraging 
readers to buy, saying that property would soon be worth 
double its then value, etc. Any intelligent man cognizant 
to the least degree of the real estate situation must have 
known that such an estimate was unwarranted. You have 
treated other matters in a way equally biased, it seems to 
me. Yet a newspaper is supposed to present all subjects 
to its readers, without prejudice or bias, 

" ' Recently you have criticised Mr. DeGroot. Have you 
been fair to him? Have you enumerated all that he has 
done for Queens? In the matter of his Commissioner of 
Records bill, and the Hammitt letter, have you stated his 
side of the case or requested him to do so? If not, why 
not? 

" ' W. E. Hendrie. 

" ' Lester Ave., Richmond Hill.' 

" As proof that there is a ' nigger ' somewhere, it is only 
necessary to state that the criticism of Mr. DeGroot did 
not in any way refer to the Equal Pay bill, and yet every 
letter received by the Record comes from a male teacher." 

Contrast the circular sent out by the women teachers: 

" Notice. 

"Let us be noted for our appreciation and gratitude. 

" Mr. Robert S. Conklin, Republican, was our standard- 
bearer in the Assembly. He is seeking re-election in the 
2 1 St Assembly District, Manhattan, being the territory em- 
braced in the following: 

" Beginning at the foot of West 133d street, to Amster- 
dam avenue, to West 130th street, to Convent avenue, to 
Morningside avenue E, to West 123d street, to Eighth 
avenue, to West 127th street, to Fifth avenue, to West 
135th street, to Lenox avenue, to West 136th street, to 
Seventh avenue, to West T4ist street, to North River. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 321 

" Mr. John V. Sheridan, Democrat, renominated in the 
35th Assembly District, New York, and Mr. Warren I. Lee, 
Republican, renominated in the i8th Assembly District, 
Kings, are the only Assemblymen from the City of New 
York in the last Assembly, who are seeking re-election, 
who did not vote for our bill either before or after the 
Mayor's veto. 

" Interborough Association of School Teachers. 

" N. B. — All other Assemblymen who have been renom- 
inated voted for our bill." 

As evidence that our course in taking an interest in pol- 
itics was not disapproved by all, I print with the writer's 
permission, the following from a letter written me by Hon. 
Clarence R. Freeman, Alderman Thirty-first District, New 
York. 

Extract from letter of October, 1907: 

" In my opinion, the teachers can do a very great deal in 
forwarding their legislation, if they find out what districts 
are the so-called close districts, and in such sections ask the 
candidates on either side for an expression of opinion upon 
' Equal Pay ' platform, and whether they would be willing 
to support that platform, if elected. By way of convincing 
candidates that it is worth while to answer such questions, 
you might tabulate the names and addresses and total num- 
ber of women teachers and sympathizers residing within a 
given district. 

" Personal letters written by the teachers to their friends 
asking for the support of some special candidate, are very 
effective. Also, the enlistment of the active aid of the male 
relatives of all such teachers. From experience, I can say 
that a handful of workers, if determined, can make 300 or 
400 votes for any reputable candidate." 

New York Glohe, October 31, 1909. 
School Editor of the Glohe: 

" Sir : Will you kindly inform me where I can get a bal- 



322 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

lot to conform to the wishes of ' Equal Pay for Equal 
Work ? ' I want tO' vote for those who favor the idea and 
scratch those who do not. I also protest against the action 
of the Board of Education in attempting to deprive their 
teachers of the rights of citizens. 

" Manhattan, Oct. 29. A Citizen." 



(" You could probably secure the information by address- 
ing the president of the Women Teachers' Association, Miss 
Grace C. Strachan, Brooklyn, You reside in Assemblyman 
Conklin's district. He introduced the women teachers' bill. 
Governor Hughes vetoed it. Messrs. Chanler, Whalen, 
Hauser and all the present state officers, except Governor 
Hughes, gave assistance to the women during their cam- 
paign. Senator White, the Republican candidate for lieu- 
tenant-governor is the author of the ' White Equal Pay ' 
bill vetoed by Governor Hughes. The women are not al- 
lied with any party, but are supporting those persons who 
aided them in their campaign or who favor the ' equal pay ' 
principle." — School Editor.) 

New York, October 9, 1907. 
"Dear Madam: 

" The part that I took during the last session of the Legis- 
lature in promoting the interests of the New York City 
school teachers is no djoubt still fresh in your mind. At all 
times I had charge of the Equalization Bill, and twice suc- 
ceeded in passing it in the Assembly. In addition, I fre- 
quently acted as advisory counsel to the Interborough Asso- 
ciation in its campaign. 

" I have been renominated for Member of Assembly by 
the Republican organization of this 21st Assembly District, 
and I am writing to ask your support, and through you that 
of your friends and relatives. As this is what is sometimes 
described as an ' off ' year, many citizens will not register 
and vote unless urged to do so. I am depending upon you 
to do all you can to bring about my re-election. We need 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 323 

every vote we can get. If citizens do not register they can- 
'not vote. Ask them to register and vote. Last day of 
registration is Monday, October 14, 1907. 
"Very truly yours, 

" Robert S. Conklin, 
" Member of Assembly, 

**2ist Assembly District." 
Department of Latin, 
The Morris High School, 
i66th Street and Boston Road. 

May I, 1907. 
" Assemblyman Conklin, 

"Dear Sir: — I am writing you again with reference to 
the White Bill for which you voted for reasons best known 
to yourself. The enclosed chpping voices the sentiments of 
sane and fair-minded citizens. Furthermore, the male 
teachers in your district have organized and are about to 
pledge their support to the men who favor their interests 
in this bit of legislation. I am captain of the High School 
division of about thirty men, who represent five times as 
many votes. There is hardly a man among us who is not a 
member of some fraternal order or organization in which 
he can influence votes. It might pay you to bear this in 
mind when the bill comes to you after the mayor's veto — if 
such a joke bill ever does come back. 

" Very truly, 

" Austin Hall Evans." 

" 44 W. 128. 

" May 3, 1907. 
" Mr. Austin H. Evans, Esq., 
"44 West 128th St.: 
" I have before me your letters of April 29th and May 
1st, respectively. In courtesy I should answer the former, 
the discourtesy of the latter requires that it should receive 
some attention. Permit me to suggest that if you desire to 
influence members of the legislature you are adopting ex- 
tremely injudicious methods in attempting to do so. 



324 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" It is not unusual to find among people of a low order 
of intelligence and morality a conception of public officials 
as men so lacking in decency and courage as to be swayed 
in the discharge of duty by threats as to their political 
welfare. 

" We have, however, a right to expect a more wholesome 
attitude to prevail among people of education and culture 
to which class your position and language would seem to 
indicate that you belong. And in the most friendly spirit, 
I suggest that before writing any other letters of like char- 
acter to other legislators, you and your associates carefully 
read Sections 46, 67 and 127 of the Penal Code. 

" In the matter in which you are interested as in all other 
matters that have come before the legislature, I have acted 
according to my best judgment and conscientiously in the 
interests of the public at large rather than in the interests 
of any particular class. With all due respect to your polit- 
ical power, I shall continue to act according to my best 
judgment and ask no support from those who would re- 
quire anything else of me. 

" We have carefully considered this school question and 
given a most respectful hearing to the male teachers. We 
have been unable to see, from any argument presented, 
wherein the men's present financial position would in any 
way be affected. 

" I think on sober reflection that you will come to realize 
that there has been a rather unwise show of temper in the 
matter. 

"Just what will be done in the event of a veto by the 
mayor, I am not now prepared to say. But you can rest as- 
sured that threats will have a tendency to facilitate the bill's 
passage over the mayor's veto rather than to retard it. It 
will have to be considered in a somewhat different light 
than on its original passage, but in the interests of whole- 
some civil spirit, I assure you that whatever action is taken, 
will be taken irrespective of its vote getting or vote losing 
influences. 

"Very truly yours, 

(Signed) "Robert S. Conklin." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 325 

"April 3, 1908. 
" Miss Grace C. Strachan, 
"293 Henry St., 

" Brooklyn, N, Y. 
"My dear Miss Strachan: 

" I regret to inform you that at the last session of the 
Cities Committee last night I could not secure the report 
of the Teachers' Bill. We were in session until half-past 
one o'clock. I do not think it will be in violation of our 
pledge to say nothing of proceedings in executive session 
for me to tell you that you have a very strong ally in Mr. 
Smith ; he has made a very vigorous fight for the bill and 
it has at times looked as if we would carry the proposi- 
tion. I have all along thought that the Committee would 
release this bill towards the end of the session; it now 
appears that I was mistaken. If there had been a full 
attendance of the house this morning I should probably 
have moved to discharge the Committee from further con- 
sideration of the bill because this was the last day on 
which that could be done. There were not over seventy 
(70) members present in the house, however. It may 
possibly be that the Rules Committee will report the meas- 
ure. The Rules Committee will be guided of course by 
the attitude of the Speaker. Senator White, if he takes 
a vigorous stand on this proposition, has powerful influ- 
ence in this branch of the Legislature. He may be able to 
get it out. The only other member of the Rules Com- 
mittee besides the speaker on whom you can probably make 
any impression is Mr. Merritt. 

" Again expressing my regret and disappointment at my 
inability to bring about results satisfactory to yourself, I 
remain, 

" Very truly yours, 

(Signed) "Robert S. Conklin." 

"Oct. 10, 1908. 
''Dear Miss SfracHan: 

" In response to a notice sent out by A. H. Evans, the 
Vice-President of the men teachers of Manhattan, a meet- 



o 



26 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



ing was held yesterday afternoon at the Harlem Y. M, 
C. A. It was well attended by these gentlemen. The news I 
get is to the effect that they are much better equipped with 
funds this year than they were last, and that they are to 
work with better organization than they have heretofore. 
It was stated at the meeting that I was to be the partic- 
ular object of attack in order that an example might be 
set to other evil-doers. I believe that they have some 
scheme for trying to operate in the negro districts, of 
which we have several. 

" I do not think, in view of the fact that this is a 
national election, that any of the local candidates will be 
in any danger if the district goes for the national ticket. 
For the present I simply wish to call the proceedings at 
this meeting to your attention in order that you may con- 
sider them in your deliberations. 

" Very respectfully yours, 

(Signed) "Robert S. Conklin." 

" New York, Oct. 29, 1907. 
"My Dear Miss Strachan: 

" As one of the registered voters of the district, 

I received the circular sent out by the Interborough Teach- 
ers and am very much pleased with the same. The men 
teachers have, I understand, had a meeting which was at- 
tended by invitation by my opponent, * , 

whose card I enclose. They are working openly against 
me now and are preparing, I understand, to send out mat- 
ter in opposition to me this week. 

" Assemblyman had a good idea. He sent to each 

teacher in his district a list of the voters in the house in 
which she lived, and asked her to see everyone of them. 
If it had occurred to me, I should have had the circular 
you sent the teachers make the same suggestion and en- 
closed a list of voters from the City Record. However 
the matter may turn out, I want to thank you for the way 
in which you have * made good " in my behalf, 
" Very truly yours, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 327 
Extract from letter of Oct. 2, 1907 : 

"As you are aware, I am again a candidate for the 
Assembly and hope to be re-nominated on Friday. My 
District is the * * * 

" I intend writing to every teacher living in that neigh- 
borhood and I hope that you and your friends will be 
able to assist me in not only getting out the registered 
vote, but by the votes of your friends. I shall be very 
glad to have a letter from you that I could use to the 
teachers of my district. 

" Yours sincerely, 



In the campaign of 1909, we sent the following letter 
to each Alderman, Member of Assembly, and any candi- 
date for city office which involves membership in the 
Board of Estimate and Apportionment: 

Brooklyn, October 11, 1909. 
To . , 

Candidate for . 

Dear Sir: 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers is 
an organization whose membership comprises more than 
twelve thousand women in the public schools of the City 
of New York. 

Since April, 1906, this Association has been striving to 
secure such amendment of the salary schedules under 
which the teachers are paid, as will abolish the discrim- 
inations against women. 

The Department of Education is the only city depart- 
ment which is excepted from the provisions of the Civil 
Service Law. 

In no other department does the salary of a position 
vary with the sex of the incumbent. 

This Association is naturally and properly desirous of 
knowing your attitude on this matter, and begs a reply 
to the following question : 

Do you believe that all city employees ivhose appoint- 



328 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

nient is made from an eligible list, should be paid accord- 
ing to the position held, without regard to the sex of the 
employee? 

Should you so desire, a committee representing our As- 
sociation will be pleased to call upon you at your con- 
venience, outside of school hours. 

Very respectfully, 

Isabel A. Ennis, Secretary. 
Please send reply to: 

Miss Grace C. Strachan, 
1308 Pacific Street, 
Brooklyn, N. Y. 

The following are some of the replies in whole or in 
part : 

" October 15, 1909. 
" Miss Grace C. Strachan, 
" 1308 Pacific Street, 
" Brooklyn. 
"My Dear Miss Strachan: 

"I have your circular favor of the nth instant in which 
you request an expression of my views on the subject of 
equal payment for equal service to school teachers of both 
sexes. 

" I am glad to inform you that I am very much in 
sympathy with your contention on this subject, and I fully 
feel with you that all city employees whose appointment 
is made from an eligible list should be paid according to 
the position held without regard to the sex of the employe. 
" If the committee which you so kindly say will be 
pleased to call upon me can offer any practical suggestion 
by which I can aid your Association to bring about that 
result, I shall be very glad indeed to see the committee 
at its own convenience. 

" Sincerely, 

"John H. McCooey." 

"As a matter of principle I do believe that municipal 
employees should be paid without regard to the sex of 
the employe. Without ever having made a study of the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 329 

application of this principle to the public school teachers 
of New York City,, my convictions have always been upon 
the side of equal salaries for men and women teachers. 

" Before passing upon the question finally, however, and 
certainly before taking any official action upon it, should 
it be my good fortune to be elected to the office for which 
I am now a candidate, I wish to have before me all the 
facts bearing upon the question, as, for instance, the char- 
acter of work done by the teachers of both sexes. 
" Yours very truly, 

"John Purroy Mitchell." 

"My Dear Miss Strachan: 

" I have received one of your circulars wanting to 
know where we stand. I presume it was sent to me be- 
cause I am on the list of candidates — in other words, am 
enjoying a little distinction for a few brief weeks — but 
you know where I stand — don't you? I have not changed 
my views one iota from what I said at the meeting in 
March, 1908. 

" With very best wishes, believe me, 
" Yours very truly, 

" William A. Prendergast." 



"New Brighton, N. Y., Oct. 16, 1909. 
"Dear Miss Strachan: 

"In reply to your circular of October nth, 1909, I de- 
sire to say, in answer to question asked, that I believe that 
all city employees, whose appointments are made from 
eligible lists, should be paid according to the position held, 
without regard to sex of the employee. This has always 
been my stand in this matter, and anything that I can do 
in my humble way towards helping you I will be pleased 
to do. 

" Wishing you success, I am, 

" Yours truly, 
" Charles J. McCormack, 
" Democratic Candidate for Borough 
President of Richmond." 



330 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 
Democracy of November 6, 1909, said : 

" With Mayor-elect Gaynor, John Purroy Mitchell, 
President-elect of the Board of Aldermen, and WilHam A- 
Prendergast, as the next Comptroller, the women teach- 
ers of Greater New York are more than ever confident 
of success in their campaign for equal pay. All three men 
are known to be in favor of the equal pay bill. 

"At a meeting of the Interborough Association held in 
May of 1908, Judge Gaynor was the presiding officer, 
with Mr. Prendergast as the speaker of the evening. 

" Practically all the candidates for either Alderman or 
Assemblyman, who have pronounced themselves in favor 
of the equal pay bill, have been re-elected, Assemblyman 
Conklin, who twice introduced the Equal Pay bill, was 
re-elected, as was Assemblyman Foley, the introducer of 
the Gledhill-Foley bill. Assemblyman Sheridan of the 
Bronx, who has for three years in succession voted against 
the bill, was this year defeated. Assemblyman Warren I. 
Lee, who is known to be against the bill, has been re- 
elected. Thomas P. Peters, Republican candidate for 
Register, and one of the women teachers' greatest op- 
ponents, was defeated by a greater majority than any 
candidate on the Kings County Republican ticket." 

" I am heartily in favor of the equal pay movement. 
I believe that women should get the same pay as men for 
the same work. If a woman is considered competent 
enough to be placed in charge of certain work, her sex 
should not be considered, for really that has nothing to 
do with the matter. She should be paid for the work, 
not because she happens to be a woman, but because she 
is entitled to the standard of wages, whatever that be. — 
Robert R. Moore, Democratic candidate for Comp- 
troller." 

One hundred fifteen answers were received. Only one, 
that of Cyrus C. Miller,* was unfavorable. Three were 

* Mr. Miller's letter appears in Part IV, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 331 

noncommittal. One hundred eleven, that is, 96.5 per cent., 
were favorable. Mr. Miller was elected President of the 
Bronx, but his success was largely due to the fact that 
Mr. Louis Hafifen split the Democratic vote by running 
on an independent ticket. The only New York City Dem- 
ocrat in either house, who voted against the Equal Pay 
bills, Mr. John V. Sheridan, of the Bronx, was defeated 
in this election. Thirty-five of the candidates for As- 
sembly had previously voted for the Equal Pay bills, 
thirty-one were re-elected. Of the four who were de- 
feated, two were in Queens districts, and as the Queens 
County Republican organization has always been most 
friendly to the women teachers' cause, we had to be neu- 
tral. Another was Mr. Cuvillier, of the 30th district, New 
York, who was prevented by a serious attack of pneu- 
monia from taking any part in the campaign, and whose 
opponent, Peter Donovan, was on the Fusion ticket and 
was an avowed friend of "Equal Pay." The fourth was 
Adolph Stern, of the 6th district, New York. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

BIRD STORY 

Once upon a time a plain, ordinary Woman Teacher 
went to see a Lady of High Degree, She wanted to make 
the Lady understand the " Women Teachers' Cause." 
She cared not that the door was opened noiselessly by a 
noiseless liveried man and that she was conducted noise- 
lessly up a beautiful staircase to a beautiful library 
wherein was the Lady of High Degree. She cared not 
for the big blazing log fire, cared not for the perfectly 
appointed tea table that a flunkey in satin knee breeches 
and white stockings and buckled shoes rolled into proxim- 
ity to her — the plain, ordinary woman teacher — and the 
Lady of High Degree. She cared not for the tea and 
the cakes and the bonbons, so charmingly served by so 
charming a Lady, though she could not but take note of 
the beautiful, perfect hands as they daintily flitted among 
the tea things or lay on the folds of the pretty blue silk 
negligee the Lady wore, and she thought, " I suppose, 
she need never even wash those hands of her very own, 
if she doesn't want to." But indeed she cared not for all 
these trifling things. Hers was a serious mission. This 
Lady of High Degree had power to assist the thousands 
of women teachers whom she represented. Nor was that 
all : to assist them was to uplift all womankind. The Lady 
of High Degree would herself be uplifted. So the plain, 
ordinary Woman Teacher talked and talked and strove 
to put into her words all that she felt and all that she 
meant — labored hard to make that Lady of High Degree 
see why she and fifteen thousand other women teachers 
had banded together and were waging a war against ex- 
isting laws. She answered many questions and tried to 
clear up many doubts. And when a long time had gone 

332 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 333 

by, and she was hoping the day was won, the Lady of 
High Degree said : " I thank you very much. I am most 
interested. But I am not sure that women can do the 
same work as men. I am not certain that it is in nature 
for them to do so. Now, I am very much interested in 
birds. In fact, I have an aviary on my top floor and I 
spend much time there. And I have been watching those 
birds, and I must say, / notice that the work of the male 
birds is very different from the work of the female birds." 
And that night as the tired Woman Teacher lay awake, 
she thought, " What's the use ! We don't speak the same 
language." 



PART TWO— CHAPTER ONE 
IN ASSEMBLY HEARING, MARCH, 5, 1907 

Robert S. Conklin : — In behalf of 10,000 to 15,000 citizens who 
don't consider it reprehensible to favor this question I present these 
petitions signed by them in refutation of the position that has been 
taken by Judge Butts. 

I can't hope to answer all of the arguments that have been ad- 
vanced by so many speakers on the other side, but only rise to de- 
fend my own position in having introduced this bill in the Assembly. 
I think one of the speakers on the other side has referred to a 
college professor as authority for his own position. There is an- 
other one of the foremost authorities on municipal government in 
the world, one under whom I studied, one whose works are read 
and are a basis for study in every college throughout the country — 
Professor Goodnow, of Columbia — and I may say that he is one of 
the foremost home rulers in America to-day? Yet, on pages 83 
and 84 of his book of municipal problems, I find this quotation : 

" Experience has shown that the common schools could not, with 
due regard to their best interests, be left in the controlled manage- 
ment of local bodies. In some states, as in New York, the powers 
of the central authority are very large. There is no question that 
the adoption of the central administration of control has been of 
the greatest benefit in the field of education." 

Some twenty-five years ago there came to this chamber a young 
man from New York City, and he at that time laid the foundation 
of his great reputation as a reformer. He was one who was al- 
ways fighting for the best that could be had for cities, for govern- 
ment at large, for the interests of the people. He laid the founda- 
tion of his reputation at that time. Subsequently, when he was 
Governor of this State in 1899, this man, notwithstanding the fact 
that he was the earnest advocate of home rule for cities, made the 
initial step in the question of education, and provided that the board 
of education, or rather the City of New York, would be compelled 
to pay to the teachers in the educational system something like liv- 
ing compensation. The ratification of that man's position is seen 
in the fact that he has since been advanced from the position of 
Governor to the Executive of the United States — Theodore Roose- 
velt. 

It was he who first had enacted into law, who himself signed this 
Davis law, which we are only seeking to amend. We are not seek- 
ing for any further encroachment upon the powers of the city au- 

334 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 335 

thority than is authorized by this Davis law. Now let us see 
wherein the justification lies. 

It has well been said by Judge Butts that the State Legislature 
has not so far attempted to interfere with the conditions in any 
other city throughout the state. But are not the conditions in New 
York City such as to warrant the interference of the legislature? 
Why, this legislature here to-day is bending and swaying at times, 
under public opinion generated in New York City, by the public 
school children of some ten or fifteen years ago. Isn't it within 
the province of this legislature, to see that that public opinion is 
properly formed, and how is it to see to it unless it provides for 
the proper education of those children? 

It seems to me that the main matter for this committee to con- 
sider is whether this legislature has the right to butt in and try to 
regulate salaries in the City of New York. As to the qualifications 
of men teachers or women teachers, we have two exhibits here. 
Look at this picture (pointing to women teachers) ; and then on 
that (pointing to men teachers). And I must submit the case 
without argument. 

Now, the question to be considered is whether the City of New 
York is doing its simple duty. It has the money to spend. Year 
after year they are increasing salaries down there. And what have 
they done for the teachers? . . . They are increasing salaries 
in other departments, and isn't it time for the State of New York, 
which has so much at stake, to say that this money — this increase 
in the city budget, if increase there shall be — that some of this in- 
crease shall go to the teachers? The board of estimate and 
apportionment has refused to appropriate the necessary money. 
Isn't it up to this legislature to say that in this matter of education 
at least, it is going to see that a proper compensation is received by 
these teachers in the New York schools? Look at the responsibility 
that is laid upon them. Yesterday I was riding down Third Avenue 
and saw a school in flames at 96th Street. I got out of the car. 
Mothers and fathers were running everywhere to find out what had 
become of their children. There was a teacher in that school 
teaching one of the lower grades, who by her own action was 
responsible for getting out those 2500 children in safety from the 
danger that menaced them. The teacher was Miss Blakeslee, I 
believe. I don't know what salary she was receiving, but I know 
she was in one of the lower grades. This teacher, with the 
responsibility of those 2500 lives, was receiving from $600 up to 
$1300, according to the time she had been in the service. Is this 
a proper compensation for anybody with such responsibilities upon 
her? 

That is the reason I stand here as an advocate of this bill, be- 
cause I don't believe the City of New York is doing the right thing 
by them. Do you know anything about what the problem is in the 
public schools? Have you ever seen these immigrants pouring in 



336 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

as they come over from Ellis Island — these hundreds of thousands 
that come in and take up their residence in New York City? It 
becomes the duty of the teachers of the New York public schools 
to light in those faces the soul that has been blotted out. 

The city authorities have refused to take advantage of the 
privilege that is given them by the Davis law, and give to these 
women anything like what seems to be a proper compensation. 
And yet these children are going home and these parents are being 
educated by the children who are sent out by the public schools. 
This great party of immigrants who have done so much towards 
the shaping of policy in New York City, are receiving their impres- 
sions through their children, and those children are being taken 
care of by the public school teachers. Now, it seems to me that 
this is a state matter. It is a matter in which the state has a right 
to take a hand. 

We don't care so much about, as far as we legislators are con- 
cerned, these controversies between men and women. We simply 
tried in this bill to determine what is the proper compensation for 
women. Where the compensation had been fixed by the legisla- 
ture, so far as the men were concerned, we determined that that 
compensation once being fixed (and it has never been questioned) 
is a proper compensation ; that this compensation once being fixed 
was a proper criterion to go by; and we have tried to provide in 
this bill that these women shall receive that compensation. 

Lyman A. Best : — When Governor Roosevelt signed the Davis 
Bill, which this bill proposes to amend, he made the statement that 
there was one thing about the bill which was wrong, and that was 
that it discriminated against the women. He was urged, however 
to sign the bill, although there was a discrimination against the 
women, and the statement was made that the evil would be cor- 
rected. A gentleman who was in the room said that when the time 
came this evil could be corrected, and the women who were doing 
the same work as men, properly recognized and given the same 
compensation as men, and he would be the first one to come up 
here and urge that that error be corrected. That gentleman was 
the first one to get up before the Senate Committee on Cities last 
week, and he was the first one to get up before this committee this 
afternoon in opposition to these ladies. 

I represent an association of 4500 people. At a meeting of the 
representatives of said association at which every school was rep- 
resented, and at which there were present over 50 men, a vote 
was taken as to whether we should sustain the women in this 
fight for equal pay. The vote was in favor of the women. Two- 
thirds at least of the men teachers and principals of Brooklyn are 
heartily in favor of paying the women the same salaries if they 
are doing the same work. 

The claim is made that the city must pay these larger salaries 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 337 

to a man because he has a family or a prospective family. Accord- 
ing to that, he should pay a certain pension to the city for the 
privilege of teaching school. The city is not employing teachers 
for the purpose of furnishing support to their families. They are 
not called except for the purpose of educating the children. We 
put in charge capable and competent men and women, and if the 
women do the same work, we believe that the laws of right and 
justice demand that they should receive the same salary. I am 
getting no increase of salary by this proposition. I favored the 
increase before the Interborough Association of Teachers was 
formed. If we wanted to do so we could give you a hundred 
cases where women have the burden of the support of families on 
their shoulders. I know you will find many more women than men 
in the grades who are supporting families. 

We are asking you to give the extra salary to these women be- 
cause they are doing the work, and they are doing it as well as the 
men. I am principal of one of the largest schools in the city, at one 
time with 70 teachers under me. In that list, I am sorry to say 
that there has been a much larger percentage of failures among the 
men than the women. They are not men that have prepared them- 
selves to be teachers or that care to be teachers ; they are using 
it as a stepping stone to something else. Their heart is not in their 
work. A man teacher came to me some years ago, and said that 
he had tried hard and yet he knew he was a f aihire. I said : — 
Will you follow my advice? There is a piece of paper and there 
is a pen ; write out your resignation. He did so. To-day he is an 
engineer, getting a larger salary than he could ever get as a 
teacher. And there are other men of the same class. There are 
women teachers, too, who are failures, undoubtedly. The percent- 
age is not equal to that of men. They go into the profession with 
the idea of making it their life work. The best men do not go into 
the work unless they have a missionary spirit and are not looking 
for results in salary only. 

When a man says here that this is going to cost ten or twelve 
million of dollars, he is saying that which he knows is not true. 
Careful estimate shows that it will be under six millions of dollars. 
Under the provisions of the Davis law, the cost was larger than 
that. The time has come when the evil which has been upon these 
women for the past seven years should be rectified. If it costs 
twenty million dollars for the purpose of rectifying an injustice, let 
it. I sincerely trust that you will report this bill absolutely un- 
amended. 

Mr. O'Loughlin (speaker not known to women teachers) : — If 
you only knew my position you would appreciate the opportunity 
that the chairman has given me here — and I begged it of him — to 
say a few words. 

In the first place, my mother was a school- teacher. In the second 



338 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

place, my sister was a school eacher. In the third place, a sister- 
in-law of mine was a school teacher. In the fourth place, another 
sister-in-law is a school teacher. And, to cap the climax, I married 
a school teacher. Now, if my folks should find out that I was 
here in Albany to-day, and went back to Kings County and did not 
stand here and raise my voice for this bill, which is honest, and 
true, and just, why there would be nothing left of the hair on my 
head, that is all. 

I am here merely to bring a message to the committee. A week 
and a half ago, an organization was formed and called " The In- 
dependence League of the 12th Assembly District of Kings." This 
organization of 800 men met and adopted a resolution favoring this 
bill, and calling upon the members of the legislature to give the 
teachers what really belonged to them. When this subject came up 
in our organization of workingmen, I didn't quite understand it at 
first, and I said, " Just what is this thing? " They said it is a mere 
matter of some fellow doing his work on the job and doing it right, 
and if he does it right he ought to get pay for it. A man got up 
and gave some of this kind of talk, and before he got through all 
the men were backing him. Another fellow from another union 
said : " It is simply this : Here is a woman who does a certain 
amount of work and gets $600 ; here is a man who does the same 
work, and he gets $900. If this is allowed to continue, the first 
thing you know it will be allowed to come into the union." All 
agreed in declaring it a scab game, and said : " We are not going 
to stand for it." 

One man said he was in a cigar factory; it had about 50 men 
employed; they were all expert cigarmakers. After a while the 
boss put in two machines. The boss said, " These machines do 
the work, we will give that job to a woman: you men wouldn't want 
that, you are all experts; that is a woman's job; being a woman's 
job, you don't want a woman's wages; we will give the women 
half." And so the women got half. After a while they put in 
another machine, and out went five more men, and so on until they 
all had machines. This man returned, and the boss said : " There 
is a machine idle ; go to work." He started it ? " How about the 
wages?" He said: "Whatever the machine pays." "That is a 
woman's pay." "Oh," they said, "things are different now; with 
the machines the pay is all alike — man, woman or child." 

Since I was assigned to come and bear this message, I have been 
trying to find out who is opposing this measure. I find it is a 
handful of men teachers. What do you want — you men teachers? 
What is your argument? What can a man gain by trying to keep 
a woman down? If a woman does the same kind of work he does, 
it is to his benefit that she get the same pay. In a short time, as 
I understand it, from an economic standpoint they will employ more 
men. 

The point is simply this. I was coming up in the train. I heard 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 339 

a man say, " I don't consider any of those women in there as good 
a teacher as I am." I says: "Why?" "Well, I am a man and 
she is a woman." I said : " She is doing the same kind of work." 
He said : " No." " Then," I said, " the city is not doing the right 
thing, putting somebody on that job when they can't do the work 
right ; they ought to put one on there who will do the work right." 
I came up here, not to make a speech; I came because I was 
asked to bear this message. There are 900 men in the 12th As- 
sembly District of Kings County who favor this bill. If that 
amounts to anything, I offer it to you. 

Miss Ellen T. O'Brien, Treasurer Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers : — The statement has been made in the press that 
the qualifications required of women are not the same as those re- 
quired of men. I stand here, gentlemen, to refute that statement. 
When I took the examination for the principal's license, a man sat 
in front of me, a man on one side. All went into the examination 
at the same time and answered the same questions. If the board of 
examiners discriminated between men and women in examining 
those papers they were not true to their charge. 

The statement has been made that in emergencies women fail. 
I deny that from personal experience. I am principal of one of 
the lower East Side schools composed of 2500 children. Last June, 
during the course of some special work being carried on by the 
Board of Health, the parents came to the school suddenly in great 
excitement and created almost a riot. They thought that their 
children's throats were being cut. They rushed into the school to 
save their children. My grade teachers — all women — braved that 
crowd, led those children out, showed them to the parents, and got 
them back again into the school in five minutes. 

A few months ago an explosion of one of the steam pipes oc- 
curred in my school. Through the ignorance of some one of the 
immigrants in the neighborhood a false alarm was sent in; and be- 
fore I knew what had happened my school was thrown into a panic 
by the fire department coming and rushing to our aid. My women 
teachers cleared the school in three minutes. Can anyone say that 
a woman is not equal to an emergency after that? 

One of the speakers (Mr. Cronson) has referred to Ladd's 
Physiological Psychology. I studied in the same University, in the 
same class with the gentleman who spoke about Mr. Ladd. Every- 
body knows that nobody can tell what Ladd means. 

IN SENATE ON WHITE BILL, APRIL 15, 1907. 

Senator White: — Mr. President, I would ask the indulgence of 
the Senate and its attention for a few moments, as this is a very 
important bill, and I believe every one about this circle will be in- 
terested to hear the facts in relation to it. 



340 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The Senator from the Seventh (Senator McCarren) early in the 
session, introduced a bill to correct what had seemed to many of 
us a very unjust condition of affairs in the public schools of the 
City of New York. The fact is that in 190D, after a long struggle 
in the legislature, a bill arbitrarily fixing salaries and arbitrarily 
fixing the annual increase or increment for teachers' salaries in the 
City of New York, was passed. It has since been recognized that 
it was an injustice for a woman occupying a position of trust and 
importance equal to that held by a man to receive a salary different 
and much less than the salary of that man. 

That simple statement illustrates the general principle which has 
been recognized, I think, by nearly all who have viewed this subject 
in a fair and impartial light ... in other words that it was a 
just thing that the position should command the salary, and not 
have salary determined on the basis of sex. 

The Senator from the Seventh introduced a bill to obliterate this 
apparent injustice, and as to the merits of that bill I have no 
criticism to offer. The bill was earnestly considered in the Cities 
Committee, and while the Senator from the Seventh was naturally 
tenacious of the principles of his bill, I found nothing but en- 
couragement from him in my effort and in the effort of the com- 
mittee to reach a just and fair conclusion. Some of us spent days 
in New York City and elsewhere trying to get the best opinions we 
could, and the best advice we could, to the end that a bill might 
be adopted by this legislature that would meet the needs of the 
community, and do justice to all. As the result of that, a bill was 
prepared which gives to the local authorities, the Board of Educa- 
tion, the absolute power to fix the salaries of the teachers in the 
public schools, subject simply to two or three different provisions 
which were regarded as essential in the interests of and in justice 
to that vast body of men and women who have done so much to 
uplift and strengthen that great community. 

Now, Mr. President, there has been no discrimination here as 
between men and women; there has been no member of that com- 
mittee who has sought to do justice to any one at the expense of 
any other, or in recognizing any class to do injustice to any other. 
Our purpose has been solely to mature a bill which would do 
justice to all, and be based upon sound principles of legislation. 

This bill provides that the Board of Education shall fix the 
salaries; it provides that there shall be an annual increment, an 
annual increase in the salaries of all the teachers. It provides that 
the lowest salary for any grade shall be $720 per annum — and the 
committee felt that that was not too much — that the services of any 
man or woman worthy to occupy that position Avore not overpaid 
by a such a salary. . . . 

Now, after great consideration and after many days, and after 
consultation with what we believe to be the best thought among the 
women, and the best thought among the men — and I want to say 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 341 

Mr. President, that we consulted men and women whom we re- 
garded as disinterested and as well equipped to judge as any on 
this proposition — this is the final form in which the bill has been 
placed before the committee. Now so much for the general prop- 
osition. I may say that the committee, after consideration and 
deliberation, practically agreed — I won't say every Senator's views 
were fully met in all particulars, but I will assert that every mem- 
ber of the committee finally agreed — that probably all things con- 
sidered, this was as fair and as equitable a bill as we could reach. 

Senator Grady : — I hope the day will come when the principle 
embodied in the McCarren-Conklin bill will be the law, not for 
teachers alone, but for every public servant, and that not the ques- 
tion of sex, but the question of position and of merit shall rule; 
and I am prepared to defend that as a general proposition, and I 
am prepared to defend it all the more earnestly as a special prop- 
osition applicable to the schools. " He who seeks equity must 
come into the court with clean hands " and I want to say to the 
Senator from the 8th (Senator Fuller) speaking figuratively, that 
his clients haven't clean hands. Theirs are colored with the crime 
of rank injustice as shown before the Committee and written out 
in every line of the Davis bill. . . . And ever since the Davis 
bill was passed that injustice embodied in the law by that form of 
deceit which conceals the truth rather than the fault, has been 
accentuated and made more grievous by the system of legislation 
adopted by our Board of Education, until it became necessary for 
these women teachers to organize in self defense. 

And they have organized, and they have 11,000 members in their 
organization, and they have had representatives here from the be- 
ginning of the session, with not a single word uttered against the 
men, the salaries they were receiving or the increases they were 
obtaining. And the men, preparing for a second betrayal of the 
women, came here and stated that they favored the design of the 
bill, but they added " Our advantage must be preserved ; before 
you do justice to the women you must see that the men are pre- 
served in all their rights and privileges." . 

I want to say that there are several positions in which the men 
have stood where_ they have added nothing to their standing as men 
engaged in teaching the youth of our city. 

They have not been frank; they have not been fair; they have 
not been honest in the statement of their position; they have de- 
layed this bill ; they have suggested amendments which have been 
passed upon; they have insisted that they were in favor of the 
White bill as it was first reported by the Cities Committee and then 
when that White bill was amended as a compromise, they began 
again repeating the amendments, one of which is now before you, 
which they had relinquished when the first bill was reported from 
the Cities Committee. 



342 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Now I am in a position of thorough accord with that taken by 
the Senator from the Seventh (Senator McCarren). The men 
ought to be glad that this bill does not go further. We are not 
equalizing salaries now — I wish we were — but we are in a measure 
repairing the wrong done by the male teachers in the Davis law 
and before we need to be generous with the men teachers let us do 
partial justice to the 11,000 women teachers employed in the public 
schools. 

That is an old worn-out, threadbare " chestnut " — if I may indulge 
in a colloquial — that of the men being in their position for life, 
not because they love to be teachers, entering into a contract the 
end of which is their highest aim, but that the women are tran- 
sitory figures in the drama and seek some other profession as soon 
as opportunity presents. Statistics will show that in proportion to 
the number employed in the public schools of New York more 
of the women adopt the profession as a lifelong profession than 
do the men. 

And so it is with the other suggestion — you drive the men out 
of the schools. This is stated before us by men who if driven out 
of the schools would have to look to high Heaven and Eternity 
for some other place to go. We do not propose to drive the men 
out of the public schools. They are protected not only by the law, 
but by the scheming legislation of the Board of Education. . 

Just as to beat the Ferry bill I made the fare too small, just so 
to beat this bill the men who are in favor of equalization or who 
say they are, want to make the cost of it too high; they want to 
beat it by indirection ; to beat it not by answering the arguments 
urged in its favor, not by controverting a single statement made 
in support of the legislation proposed, but to beat it by just such 
another betrayal as they accomplished in the original act. 

Now those who believe in a more radical bill have yielded as 
far as men could yield; and those who believe in a conservative 
measure have gone as far as they can go, and linked together they 
propose that this bill shall pass this legislature. 

Let me conclude with an illustration of the rank injustice that 
the present law now imposes. This letter is from one of the male 
principals. Here is what he says : " I have 32 teachers under 
my direction. Of these 22 are women. Out of the 22 women 
I could readily pick a dozen for whom I would not take in exchange 
a dozen high-priced men teachers. The assistant to the principal 
in my department is a woman. If I desire to be absent from 
school for any cause for any length of time she would take charge 
of the school by official designation of the Board of Superinten- 
dents, and for the time being would to all intents and purposes be 
Principal." " Yet three of the men teachers under her would 
draw salaries respectively of $2400, $2250 and $1845, while hef 
salary would continue at its present figure $1600. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 343 

Now the bill you are voting on provides that such great, inex- 
cusable, indefensible discrimination shall be leveled down. 

I have some interests in the public schools of New York City, 
and some views on education similar to what Artemas Ward said 
exemplified his participation in the civil war, when he said he had 
lost two uncles and a cousin. I had two brothers and a sister in 
the teaching force of the public schools under the condition that 
prevailed before the passage of the Davis law, at the time when all 
the public school teachers were underpaid. I get my information 
at first hand. I am not giving you what any teacher said to me ; 
I am giving you the views of those who have lived and worked up 
to the time that their work was too irksome. I learned what they 
have to say upon this bill, and I have behind that the sentiment of 
the great City of New York. 

Votes on passage of bill, Ayes, 45 ; Noes, i. 

SPEECHES IN SENATE, MARCH 24, 1908. Preceding passage 
of White Bill. 

Senator White : — The bill before us does simply this : its striking 
feature is contained in the few words which require that the School 
Board of New York City shall make no discrimination in salary 
on account of sex. That is the essential and striking feature of 
the bill. There are certain other changes in the present law. I 
am not aware that they are particularly significant, and I doubt if 
anyone would oppose the bill on any other ground than that I have 
stated. 

The measure has been criticised because it is said that this is 
establishing a new policy for the State. It is difficult for me to 
see how any man can contend that this is a correct statement in 
regard to the bill. If the State has any policy on that subject at 
all, it is well settled; but it is settled the other way. There is no 
discrimination permitted in regard to sex, so far as I know, except 
in this particular instance. Under the Civil Service law of the 
State, there is no discrimination permitted as to sex, and successful 
competitors reach their places on the eligible list, each in his place, 
entitled to receive the same salary for the same work irrespective of 
sex. Therefore, if there is any policy of the State on this subject, 
beyond doubt it is all the other way. 

It has been said that this bill violated the principle of home rule. 
Well, the truth about that is this: The present law violates the 
principle of home rule. The present law is a mandatory provision, 
the so-called Davis law, whereby the Legislature sought to deter- 
mine absolutely within certain very narrow limits, the salaries of 
the teachers of the City of New York, and to prescribe in various 
ways, by mandatory provision, how that Board of Education should 
govern that department in this particular. This bill wipes out 
very largely the mandatory provisions and gives almost unlimited 



344 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

discretion to the Board of Education in determining these problems. 
It is true that cognizance is taken of the great evils that had existed, 
of the admitted unfairness and of admitted wrongs ; it is true that 
this bill prescribes certain mandatory provisions in relation to those 
things; but there is no sense in the argument that it is a violation 
of home rule, — that is, there can be no consistent argument because 
it is certainly a correct statement that this bill seeks to alleviate 
the situation by giving the Board greater discretion, although it 
does seek to correct the few evils of which those afifected justly 
complain. 

There is no dispute among disinterested men and women as to 
these evils; and I call attention to the fact that in the Governor's 
message of last year when he vetoed a bill of similar character — 
in that message the Governor very distinctly called attention to the 
evils and abuses, and particularly urged the correction of those 
evils. But a deaf ear has been turned to his appeal. The public 
knows perfectly well — whatever humbug and sophistry may be in- 
jected into this discussion — the public knows perfectly well that 
the present conduct of the schools of the city of New York has 
been subject to the most grave and just criticism; and this criticism 
has called forth a very earnest movement to reform and reorganize 
the Board of Education of that city. 

It is known of all men, I think generally admitted and conceded, 
that there have been abuses which have required legislative con- 
sideration. Anyone familiar with such attitude as I have been able 
to take on city questions knows that I have struggled against 
mandatory legislation, struggled against the attempt of the legis- 
lature to regulate local affairs; but there are times and conditions 
when this Legislature has been called upon to do that very thing. 
I repeat this bill gives greater discretion and greater opportunity 
for the exercise of judgment on the part of the Board of Education, 
than does the present law it seeks to amend. 

Although it must be admitted that it does prescribe certain definite 
principles under which the board must act. 

Now then, it has been urged in criticism also that in addition 
to being a violation of home rule, it is mandatory in character. I 
may say in conclusion that what this bill does is to prescribe that 
there shall be no discrimination in regard to sex — that equal work 
shall receive equal pay; and in order to accomplish that, existing 
schedules are wiped out and three or four general principles are 
laid down under which the Board of Education must act. To 
summarize, this bill fixes a minimum salary of $720 a year; it pro- 
vides for a minimum annual increment ; it prescribes that no salary 
shall be reduced as a result of the operation of this bill ; and finally, 
it prescribes that a tax of four mills shall be given to the Board 
of Education for salary purposes. 

I shall be glad to try to discuss any particular objections that 
may be raised to the bill. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 345 

Senator McCarren : — I understand that practically this is the 
same bill the Senate passed last year. I do not believe it is necessary 
to explain to the Senators outside of the City of New York what 
provisions the bill contains. In brief, they simply provide that the 
female teachers shall receive, where they perform the same work, 
the same salaries that the male teachers receive. That is a simple 
proposition and, divested of all the verbiage employed in the 
discussion of this bill, you will in the last analysis have to decide 
for yourselves as to whether the female teachers who do the same 
work as the male teachers do, are entitled to the same pay. 

It seems to me there can be no sensible refutation of that position. 
The Senator from the Sixth (Senator Travis) expressed the 
situation in a nutshell when he called attention to the fact that 
there are male teachers in primary work, and that in order to bring 
the salaries of all the female teachers employed in teaching primary 
grades to the same point, it will be necessary to add to the salary 
list of the Board of Education, about $4,000,000. If that be so, it 
should be done. 

Why should a male teacher doing less effective work in primary 
grades receive more than a female teacher? 

Every man and woman who knows anything about human nature, 
knows there should be no male teachers doing primary work at 
all. We know that they cannot do teaching in the primary grades 
as well as a woman ; and why should not a woman be paid as much 
as the men for doing better work than the men? 

I am somewhat amazed by the question suggested by the Senator 
from the Sixth with reference to the economic proposition involved 
in this bill. He is much disturbed about the financial condition of 
the City of New York, and he very properly calls attention to the 
many needs of the city. We are constantly developing and our 
needs are growing, and we need more schools, sewers, and fire 
houses and greater police and fire protection. We need an increase 
of everything incidental to the development of the city. These 
needs cannot be prevented from multiplying as we go along, and 
of course the expenses must be multiplied to meet these condi- 
tions. 

W/e need more transportation facilities? That is admitted. But 
that is no reason why the city should become a paternal govern- 
ment, and distribute its fund about to the unemployed. , 

There is no reason in the world why these worthy school 
teachers, these women, should not receive the same pay as men. 
I graduated at a public school, and no man teacher could get me 
to do anything. It was the female teachers who gave me what 
education I received. A woman can get more out of boys than a 
man. I was ready to fight the man teacher, but I was always 
ready to do what the woman teacher wanted me to do; and what- 
ever education the majority of young men of the City of New 
York received in the public schools, is entirely due to the honest. 



346 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

painstaking efforts of the women. It is their natural vocation — • 
the training of the juvenile mind. 

I want to say, Mr. President, that the finances of the City of 
New York will regulate themselves. It may be necessary to in- 
crease the valuation of the property in order to get the necessary 
money, but that will be attended to by the officials of the City of 
New York. But the proposition that we shall consider is one 
that should be considered solely on its own merits, and not in 
connection with any paternalism now in the mind of the Senator 
from the Sixth. I hope the Senators outside of the City of New 
York will bear in mind that this is a mandatory bill in all its pro- 
visions. It was passed after consultation with a number of men 
interested in educational matters in the City of New York. You 
are dealing with a mandatory law in the Davis law, and hence the 
necessity for the mandatory character of this bill. That is all 
there is to the proposition and I assume that the justice of that 
question will address itself to the intelligence of every Senator 
here who has given the subject any thought. I think the bill 
should pass unanimously. 

Senator Grady: — The first question to be determined by the 
Senate is as to whether or not for the redress of this admitted 
wrong, the women teachers of New York City have consulted the 
proper tribunal. That is, as to whether they should present their 
petition here to the legislature, or to the local authorities of the 
City of New York. 

Upon that point, the Governor of this State in his message vetoing 
the bill last year used very clear and precise language. He said 
that the Board of Education is thus directly subject to the control 
of the Legislature ; and whatever provision may be found necessary 
or wise for the purpose of defining its powers or prescribing its 
policy, must be prescribed by the Legislature. No other authority 
is competent to make such a provision. 

The Governor went on to say that the suggestion of the Mayor 
of the City of New York, that the provisions of this law, the 
original law, known as the Davis Law, and the amendments known 
as the White Bill, in any way violated home rule, was not to be 
entertained for a single moment. He said that the indication of 
its use was a matter of State concern, and that the teachers had 
applied to the proper authorities for the redress of their griev- 
ances. 

The Senator of the Sixth (Senator Travis) is in favor of equal 
pay for equal work, but requires an enormous amount of other 
things to be done, or requires that this injustice — admitted upon 
all sides, — must continue. . 

The opposition to this bill comes from the male teachers. The 
male teachers — bless their dear good hearts — they are wonderfully 
exercised for fear you will withdraw the masculine influence from 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 347 

the schools, forgetting in their excess of interest in this bill, that 
in many of our schools we had absolutely withdrawn the masculine 
element. 

We have schools going up to the 8th grade in which there is 
not a man teacher. Just think of the injustice we are doing to 
these children now when we are running big schools in New York 
without a male teacher. And they are fearful lest if you attempt 
to do justice to the woman teacher, you won't be able to deal 
generously with them. 

Now that is the position of the male teacher in New York City. 
Remember, he came here when the Davis Bill was passed, and he 
saw that his minimum wage was fixed, generously fixed. Remember 
that the woman teacher depending on that bill, giving to her the 
same generous wage and a proper annual increment, found herself 
deceived, and now they come and tell you that to do what is 
acknowledged to be simple justice to the women, means that you 
cannot afford to be generous to them, and that this bill, therefore, 
should not become a law. 

What was the Governor's objection to the bill? The Governor's 
objection was that if adopted for the City of New York, it should 
be adopted throughout the State. 

In taking that position the Governor overlooked the fact that 
New York City had been singled out of the cities of the State 
for special treatment under the provisions of the Davis law, to 
which the White bill is an amendment. But we accepted the Gov- 
ernor's veto, and we sought relief from the Board of Education, 
which he said he was sure could be relied upon to redress the 
grievances of the woman school teacher, and they did undertake 
to redress them to a degree; and then our Board of Education 
found itself as powerless as the school teachers had found them- 
selves. They asked for an increase from the Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment, which would have permitted some measure of 
justice. The suggestion that that increase was defeated by the 
action of the women school teachers or of any woman teacher or 
any representative of the women teachers, is entirely gratuitous; 
and is not borne out by the facts. 

They went to the Board of Estimate and Apportionment and 
asked for an additional allowance. The women teachers went 
before the board and asked for a larger amount that would enable 
the Board of Education to equalize their salaries. But to say 
that they opposed the lesser amount is entirely gratuitous, and has 
no foundation in fact whatever; and the Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment refused them a dollar, refused them a dollar, so 
they are powerless, this Board of Education, just as the women 
teachers are powerless or any other tribunal of the city govern- 
ment under the provisions of the Davis bill. 

Now, Mr. President, it is not for me to voice the justice that is 
behind this bill. I never went to the public schools. I never for 



348 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

an hour had the benefit of the teaching of any woman. But I know 
that the glory of the educational system in this State, as reflected 
in its public schools, belongs to that sex, and it never can be taken 
from the women teachers who have taken charge of the children 
of the people and have inclined the twig as it should go. Never 
was the work of women teachers such a contribution to the safety 
and to the welfare of the State as it is at this precise moment. 

Think of the character of the population which is daily coming 
to New York at this time. I am speaking now of that population 
that intends an absolute and ready acquiescence in every provision 
of your law. Entirelj' unacquainted with our language, coming to 
these shores with the wrongs and oppressions of the governments 
under which they have lived, fresh in their memory and active in 
their recollections — these foreigners and their children are crowding 
the schools and are being taught by these women teachers. 

First, they are taught the language of the country, and then they 
are made acquainted with the difference in conditions which changes 
their very nature from opponents of existing government to honest, 
faithful and law-abiding citizens. 

I tell you if it were not for the work of the women teachers in 
the City of New York within the last ten years we would have 
growing up now, fast approaching manhood and womanhood, an 
element of your society that no influence known to government 
could restrain. 

You would have brought up an element that believed the govern- 
ment must harass them ; you would have brought up an element 
that would regard ofBcials as the privileged and idle class; you 
would have brought up an element that would have regarded every 
condition consistent with the republican form of government as 
simply a continuation of the intolerable conditions from which they 
fled. Instead of that, you will find you have that element engaged 
to-day in every work that is intended to count for the betterment 
of their fellow man. 

Who is directing the great settlement work on the east side of 
New York City? Who are the active men that are bringing to those 
of their own race knowledge of the difference between a republican 
and a monarchial form of government? Who are the active men 
in social life of New York City? Mainly, the men who but a few 
years ago from our women teachers of New York City were 
learning the primary principles of the English language, and were 
being made acquainted with our laws and customs. 

I do not know of any element opposed to the passage of this bill 
except the male teachers ; and they oppose it because they do not 
want their contract with the city disturbed; and they claim that 
they have continued in employment under the guarantee of an 
advance in the Davis bill; but they have nothing to say about the 
contracts between them and the city when the Davis bill was 
passed. They are willing that that little agreement should not be 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 349 

regarded with the same dignit}' as applies to a contract. They 
have a better thing now. 

I want to say to you that all that we do as far as expense is 
concerned is to restore the provisions of the original Davis law. 
Do not be deceived about that. You would think we were robbing 
the public treasury of its last dollar. We are only restoring the 
provision that four mills of our own taxes shall be dedicated to 
the salaries of teachers. That w^as the original provision, and when 
we increased our assessments and found that four mills provided 
means enough to pay the good salaries to the men teachers and 
the miserable salaries to the women, instead of directing our efforts 
towards equalizing the salaries with the remainder of the four 
mills, our gentlemen friends were good enough to come to the 
Legislature and say that they thought they could get along with 
three mills, now, and let the women teachers continue under the 
inequalities and the injustice of their present existence. 

So if you restore the four mills of the original Davis bill, in 
other words make the appropriation for teachers' salaries which was 
made in the original bill, then we will take care of the rest. We 
will see that the identical wage is paid for the identical work. We 
will see that the unanimous wish of our Board of Aldermen is 
carried out, and we will restore something of the equality that 
existed in the Borough of Brooklyn up to the time that the Davis 
law was passed; and we will do an act of justice to as hard 
working and as efficient a corps of public servants as is to be found 
within the confines of this State. ' 

Bill passed 35 to 8. 



HON. E. A. MERRITT, JR., MAJORITY LEADER, 

ASSEMBLY 

In Assembly, April 29, 1909. 

GLEDHILL-FOLEY BILL 

I think that it is fair that this bill should be tested on its merits. 
If it is the pleasure of the house to pass the bill, let us pass it with- 
out amendments — without by indirection killing it. 

It is a curious thing that this question of home rule should be 
brought up by gentlemen on the other side of the House. The 
Republican party in the Legislature has been obliged for many 
years to study the questions involved in the government of the 
cities of the State, including the great city of New York, and fol- 
lowing the suggestion of the gentleman who last occupied the floor, 
do for those municipalities and that municipality the things which 
the people there desire. If the people of any of the cities of the 
State want any real reform they naturally come to the Legislature, 
which under Republican administration has always listened to 



350 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the demands of localities and given them the things which they 
desired and needed. 

There is a lot of nonsense talked about this home rule proposition. 
No city wants home rule. No city in this State wants to bear its 
burdens unreservedly by itself. And beyond and above that, our 
civic organizations prescribe that power and authority shall come 
from the people of the whole State. 

Now here is a question. Why should we have interfered years 
ago in this matter of the salaries of teachers in the City of New 
York, passing a bill which regulates it? It was done, as this is 
to be done, at the demand of the taxpayers upon the Republican 
majority of the State Legislature. Having once assumed this re- 
sponsibility, this bill or any bill of this sort naturally comes before 
the Legislature. There is a good deal of force in what my friend, 
Mr. Oliver, said. Primarily the people most affected are those 
who teach the youngest children, and it is an old saying that " the 
hand that rocks the cradle rules the world." 

I think the bill ought to be passed, in its form here, properly 
authenticated as it is by title and in other ways. I do not care if 
it adds four million dollars to the expense of running the City of 
New York. They want it there. I know there is a feeling that 
it ought to be, down there. I know that when the administration 
of the City of New York wants to, it can easily save, without in- 
creasing the tax budget, the amount necessary to make this increase. 
I know that they do not want to do it — at least I am afraid so, and 
it is a thing I do not quite understand. But they seem — they don't 
seem to be quite eager to economize as they ought to be. But 
here is something that the people want, and I undertake to say to 
you, gentlemen, that if the administration of New York City wants 
to do it, they can do it and not spend one dollar more than they 
do now; and after they have paid this charge, if it is six million 
dollars, they could have another six million and still do this if 
they want to. . , . 

MAYOR'S HEARING, May ii, 1909. 

Senator McCarren : — The opponents of the bill hold that since 
this bill is of a mandatory character, it therefore should not be 
accepted by the Mayor. 

Now let me call the attention of Your Honor to the genesis of 
the so-called Davis Law under which the system is now operating. 
After the consolidation of the old City of New York and the old 
City of Brooklyn, and the other territory, a great deal of agitation 
was set on foot for the purpose of establishing and fixing the 
salaries that should be paid to the public school teachers. There 
was considerable difference of opinion, and those who contended as 
to the right of local authority to regulate the salaries of the 
teachers did so on the ground that it was a question that affected 



EQUAL PAY: FOR EQUAL WORK 351 

this locality and following out the principle of home rule, the 
local authority should be permitted to fix the salary for the place. 
I have no quarrel with that proposition. 

After considerable effort and many attempts on the part of the 
local authorities to fix satisfactorily the salaries of school teachers, 
they discovered they could not do it because of the conflicting 
views and of the different interests, and their inability to come 
to a unanimous agreement. So that the question was brought to 
the legislature. After a great deal of conference over it, and more 
or less agitation, the so-called Davis bill was evolved which arbi- 
trarily fixed the schedules imder which the school teachers are now 
being paid. So I would like to have Your Honor keep in mind 
this fact that we are operating under an arbitrary law. Yet, there 
is no proposition to repeal the Davis Law. . 

Now, therefore, we must take into account and keep in mind 
that this is an amendment of the Davis Law and the Davis Law 
is an arbitrary measure, and inasmuch as we are dealing with an 
arbitrary measure, there is no other way we can deal with it than 
to amend the arbitrary measure. Now that is what we are trying 
to do; and those who say that we are opposing the idea of Home 
Rule must keep in mind the fact that we must either repeal the 
Davis Law or amend the Davis Law which is a mandatory measure ; 
and this is, of course, a mandatory bill because it amends a man- 
datory statute — so much for that, 

I want to say also, to Your Honor, that while it may cut no 
figure with you, I desire to call your attention to the fact, that this 
bill has practically twice passed the legislature by a very large 
majority. Once vetoed by yourself and the Governor and passed 
over your veto and failing to pass over the Governor's veto because 
the attempt was not made. 

Now with reference to the equity in the bill. I want to say 
that everybody here will thoroughly agree with me when I say 
that if we owe anything at all to the scholastic system, we cer- 
tainly owe a great deal to the efficacy and to the method of the 
female teachers in the public schools. 

I cannot say too much in praise of the women teachers in our 
public schools. We know how by nature they are equipped to train 
and rear and direct the young minds. We know that the women 
teachers in our public schools are in every way equipped, and they 
give more time and they are, too, to a great extent, more deeply 
interested in their work. We know that to-day we have a class of 
young men who are teaching in our public schools for the purpose 
of earning a sufficient amount of money to enable them to enter 
some profession — the medical profession, or the profession of the 
law, — consequently they are there only temporarily; the women 
are there permanently, and not a single one of them ever hopes 
to better herself so far as an opportunity of earning a livelihood 
is concerned and she knows that she is there for life unless she 



352 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

fortunately or unfortunately gets married. Now that is the only 
way a woman teacher ever leaves the public school. So to that 
extent they look upon it as a life work. It is a labor of love with 
them. 

Now another point, it is contended that this bill if enacted into 
law, will cost the City four or five or six millions of dollars more 
than is now paid for educational purposes. 

In answer to that I want to say that those who take that position 
calculate that the City will be saving money by the non-acceptance 
of this bill. That may be true, but it is also true, that the City 
can save money by reducing these salaries. If you take 50 per 
cent, oif the salaries at the present time, that is a method of saving 
money. There are a great many different ways in which you can 
save money for the City, but that is not the question. The question 
is : Shall the City adequately pay its teachers ? 

I cannot understand how anybody can attempt to talk over the 
proposition that where equal work is done why equal pay should 
not be forthcoming. This bill provides elementally that there shall 
be equal pay for equal work, and it seems to me that it should not 
be necessary for one moment to contend for the acceptance of 
that proposition. 

Now I simply want to emphasize to those who contend that this 
is a violation of a sort of home rule — that stereotyped expression — 
that you must remember that you are amending a mandatory act. 

There is no other way that you can get at the solution of this 
proposition except by amending this mandatory act, for the system 
that we are to-day operating under is a mandatory one. The same 
thing could be said of the Fire Department and the Police Depart- 
ment. The salaries of every member of the uniformed force in both 
of these departments is arbitrarily fixed. It is provided by law, 
that when a fireman is appointed, he shall receive so much and 
that as he goes on in his graduation, he shall reach the maximum. 
The same is true in this bill, where the school teachers are asking 
for nothing more than is really due to them in their public service 
as public servants. '' 

Ezra A. Tuttle: — Mr. Mayor: I don't come here to beg for 
justice. We may beg for mercy, but justice is a thing to demand 
and to fight for. 

This bill is the embodiment of pure justice and nothing else, so 
far as it provides for equal pay for the women teachers for doing 
the same work that the men do. 

If your Honor is about to ask me if I read the bill, I will answer 
it by saying, " No." It is sufficient for me to have Senator Mc- 
Carren assure your Honor and this audience that the bill does 
provide for equal pay for the teachers both male and female, women 
and men. 

Your Honor is familiar with history, and you know that from 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 353 

the time of earliest history, down, — we will start with the English 
people, with King John — the teacher element in society, the down- 
trodden element in society, has always had to fight for its rights, 
for equality. And here we are, face to face, on the same proposition 
in this bill. It is the same in this 20th century of civilization, — 
that men, simply because they are strong physically, simply because 
tliey have relegated to themselves the right to govern, shall practice 
an injustice upon women merely because they are weaker. 

Mr. Mayor, I was trained in the normal schools of this State as 
a teacher. I have taught school. I have practiced law in this city 
for twenty-five years and more, and I want to say to you, and I 
am not ashamed to acknowledge it, that I said to Miss Strachan, 
" You may think that moral suasion is all that is necessary in this 
fight, but I think before you win it, you will find that moral force as 
well is necessary." 

Mr. Mayor, if I had been ashamed to confess that I said if the 
women teachers do not get justice out of our officials or your 
Honor, and the Governor of this State, that I would like to see 
the 15,000 teachers in this great city strike. 

The Mayor — You are the Man! 

Yes, I am the man, and I am not ashamed of it, — thank God T 
am not ashamed of it. I want to say to you, that strikes and boy- 
cotts are the means by which the downtrodden, the weaker element 
in society have always gained liberty, equity and justice; and it is 
not a thing to be ashamed of. They are despicable in the eyes 
of those who will not grant justice when only peaceful means are 
used. The labor men of America have raised themselves to their 
present position, higher than that of any other classes of laboring 
people, probably, by asserting forcefully their rights, and demanding 
justice. 

The Mayor: Do you think that the teachers will strike if I now 
exercise my constitutional and legal powers in vetoing this bill? 

Mr. Tuttle: No, sir, I do not; I am sorry to say I do not. 

The Mayor: You would encourage them? 

Mr. Tuttle: Yes, I am sorry to say it — I don't think they will. 
But I want to say to you that if you continue in the office of mayor 
for another term 

The Mayor: God forbid. (Laughter.) 

Mr. Tuttle: Amen, amen, or any mayor that succeeds you, shall 
continue this process of declining and refusing to do justice to 
these teachers, the time will come when you will see that the 
teachers will assert their rights. 

Mr. Curtis (The Central Federated Union) : — Mr. Chairman, 
and Mr. Mayor, Your Honor : We are here on behalf of the 
teachers' bill. This is a committee of five appointed by the Central 
body, of which I am the chairman. 

The body was unanimous in the endorsing of the school teachers' 



354 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

bill and we believe as organized men, that when women do the 
same work — the same class of work — as men, they should get the 
same pay. 

We also believe if there is a tax that has to be made up by the 
taxpayers, it is the working men that, as a general rule, feel it 
We are in favor of this bill, and we are willing, if it is necessary, 
to pay a little more taxes, and see that the school teachers get 
equal pay. 

Mr. Holland: Mr. Mayor, I am not representing the Board of 
Education this morning; I am representing the Central Federated 
Union. Our Federation has endorsed this bill, and it is the belief 
of our association that for equal work there should be equal pay. 

In mechanics, in electrical work, in typographical work, a woman 
doing the same identical work is given the same identical pay; in 
a machine shop where women are working alongside of men, they 
receive the same pay for the same kind of work. ... I would 
not care if I was not on the Board of Education twenty-five seconds, 
but I am going to try to be honest while I am there. 

This city was put on record some time ago as a model employer. 
I believe that here is the place where we can apply the principle 
of being a model employer and an impartial employer; and I hope 
your Honor can see your way clear at this time to sign this bill 
and give the women teachers the same opportunities as the men 
have at the present time. 

Mrs. Belle De Rivera : — Your Honor, I represent the New York 
City Federation of Women's Club, an organization which com- 
prises a membership of twenty-five to thirty-five thousand women. 
We held our semi-annual convention last Friday. I have here an 
official list of the Credential Committee from which it appears that 
191 votes were cast, and it was a unanimous vote, in favor of the 
Teachers' Equal Pay Bill. 

Mr. Freel: — Your Honor, I am here as a taxpayer of the City 
of New York. I also came here as a man who was born and 
brought up in the Lower East Side of the City of New York, over 
fifty years ago, and who has remained in his own city constantly 
for all that time; a man who, whatever in an educational way he 
possesses, owes it to the common school system of the City of New 
York; a man who is clear-eyed and a typical representative of the 
Lower East Side of the city, a man who has had to fight his way 
through and up, a man who has no misconceptions. He under- 
stands his New York, because he keeps his ear to the ground, and 
bumps elbows with conditions. 

I want to say that among the women that I recollect that have 
been helpful to me in my various fights in the battles of life, I 
place the women teachers who helped me when I was practically 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 355 

unable to help myself, on the same plane and in the same position 
exactlj', as I do my mother. 

I believe that every man that has been born in the City of Newr 
York, and every man v^rho has struggled as I have struggled, and 
has come into close relations with the teachers of the City of New 
York, are with me squarely on this proposition, and I believe that 
they are by far the large majority of the representatives of the tax- 
payers and residents of the City of New York. 

We are in favor of this measure — the people; we have no other 
alma mater than the public schools of the City of New York. 
They know very well the teachers of the City of New York, they 
have confidence in them, and they ask you and they look to you to 
approve this and forward it for the signature of the governor, and 
I believe that if you do that, you will satisfy the larger majority 
of men and women who have been born and lived all their lives in 
the City of New York. 

You may, and I have no doubt you will, dissatisfy and disgruntle 
some people who have come to the City of New York from outside 
of it, to improve conditions that they do not and never will under- 
stand; but you will satisfy the residents who live in the City of 
New York if you approve this mesure. 

Senator Gledhill: — I will be very brief, Your Honor. I am 
very proud to be the sponsor of this bill. I have been identified 
with organized labor for over 25 years, and I am a firm believer 

The Mayor: Are you a member of the Central Federation? 

No, sir, I am a member of the International Plasterers. 

I am a firm believer in high wages. I believe that when all 
classes of people who are banded together into an organization 
receives the highest consideration possible, we receive the best 
products from them. 

I feel that the school teacher is the ideal. I feel that all the in- 
spiration and all the intelligence that the average youth to-day has, 
has come from these women, or some other woman who has taught 
them. 

Now, someone has said that these teachers receive plenty. Well, 
when you think of the janitor downstairs who gets $200 a month, 
there is not much inspiration for the teachers upstairs who re- 
ceive $60. 

Organized labor, and organized movements such as these women 
are carrying on have been the means of uplifting humanity and 
making conditions better all the world over. These women are 
only asking for the addition of the one mill, it does not amount to 
anything very great. They simply ask that so much be set aside; 
and they are entitled to it. 

These male teachers, who are fighting these women and who 
ought to be ashamed of themselves — they ought to be working for 
them. Practically, let us say, they ought to be out erecting build- 



356 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

mg, or ought to be working at some physical labor for which thev 
are better fitted than for that which the women are doing and 
which they are willing to do. If they are not willing that others 
shall get the same pay that they themselves get for the same work, 
let them show us why that is not the right spirit. 

I trust. Your Honor, that you will see it in this way, and that 
you will sign this bill. 

Assemblyman Foley: — Your Honor, I desire to state that I 
have read this measure, and that I introduced it in the Assembly. 
I believe if you had asked that question last Thursday of the mem- 
bers of the Board of Education, you would have been startled by 
the number that answered : " No." 

The Mayor: What question do you mean? 

Assemblyman Foley: Have the members of the Board of Edu- 
cation read or seen the bill which passed both Houses? 

Now, the most important phase of the measure to my mind, 
after the explanations that have been given of the equal pay part 
of it — and Your Honor appreciates that the words male and female 
have been eliminated from the Davis law and are not contained in 
the measure now before you — is that it increases the minimum 
salary of the women teachers from $600 to $720. 

That the Board of Education has realized the injustice in the con- 
ditions as they now exist, appeared in their estimate submitted to 
the finance department; the governor recognized it in his veto of 
the measure two years ago; and I believe Your Honor has rec- 
ognized it. 

I hope Your Honor will sign this bill. In so doing you will 
render a great service in the cause of justice and do more good 
than it is possible for you now to appreciate. 

A TYPE OF OUR OPPONENTS 

Mr. De Muth : — I wish to speak as a representative of the tax- 
payers' association; I am a real estate dealer. 

May it please Your Honor, as the president of the West Side 
Taxpayers organization, and as an executive member of the United 
Real Estate Owners' Association of the City of New York, I 
want to enter a protest against Your Honor's signature being placed 
to the teachers' bill. ... To be properly named, it should be 
named the most gigantic grab bill that ever was put through a 
legislature, for that should be the name of the bill instead of the 
equal pay bill. 

We have with us a representative of the City of New York, and 
one of the members of the Board of Education. Here are the 
underlings of that department, the superior officers having refused 
to give them what they believe they were entitled to, because theif 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 357 

superior officers didn't think they should be entitled to the amount 
paid to these men. 

The Board of Education of New York has endeavored as far as 
possible to increase the salaries as much as possible. 

We have found here a condition of affairs existing here in this 
city that never existed in this town before. We have an attempt 
here to get out of the treasury of the City of New York, over the 
heads of the department, by the employees of the department, 
money that they believe they are entitled to. Now what have they 
done. We find these various organizations of teachers, combining 
themselves into bodies, discussing the question of how and devising 
means and ways in which they shall get this amount of money. 

They hope to equalize the salary by making the women's salary 
equal the men's salary. If you will go carefully over the bill, you 
will find I am right in my contesting it. I don't care to argue 
that particular point. Your Honor, I am arguing it from a stand- 
point of the fact that the ladies have taken a peculiar course to 
arrive at a conclusion, that they have banded themselves together 
as members of an organization. ... It has been said this 
organization went to Albany last year, I know that they were up 
there. The way they thought to pass legislation at Albany was the 
most peculiar system 

The Mayor : That is not before me either. 

Mr. De Muth: I simply want to show you how the bill was 
passed with such an enormous majority. 

The Mayor: That is surely of academic interest, the bill is 
before me. 

Mr. De Muth: We will get down to the teachers? 

The Mayor: I wish you would, because time is running on. 

Mr. De Muth: I want to get down then to the purposes of the 
teachers coming before us as men of the city department. They 
have seen that they could not get what they wanted in New York 
City from their superior officers 

The Mayor: That is not before me — — 

Mr. De Muth: They go up to Albany to get 

The Mayor: One moment. Will you please discuss the bill 
that is before me. I have already read the title twice, this bill is 
before me and there is no question involved as to whether the 
teachers ought to be here or ought not to be here. Miss Strachan 
is here with the permission of the Board of Education, I take it. 

Mr. De Muth : I hope so. I wish to say just this. Your Honor, 
we will get down to the point of it without any further argument. 

Our associations are entirely opposed to this proposition simply 
because it is going to raise a fund of three million a year, we do 
not know for how long. . . . 

The Mayor: Have you worked that out? 

Mr. De Muth: Wie have done it on that proposition. 



358 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The Mayor: Will you give it to me as you have it there? 

Mr. De Muth : We have not had any expert accountant here I0 
go over this matter and figure it out as the other side have, but 
we have arrived at our figures as best we might. 

The Mayor: You must have those figures before you. 

Mr. De Muth : We have approximately these figures. 

The Mayor: Well, give them to us. 

Mr. De Muth: I have nothing with me, but this bill extends 
over a period of three years, this increasing — the figures are ready 
to be presented and will be presented in the course of argument 
this morning, but I have not the figures. 

This bill from the start to the finish is really a salary grab bill. 
I believe Your Honor ... 

ANOTHER TYPE OF OPPONENT 

A Male Teacher: — I come to you as a man school teacher, as 
I have spent some years in the profession of teaching schools. 
. . . I was quite interested in what the man said from the 
teacher's side, telling about his school days and how he regarded 
the teachers that taught him in his school days in the same light 
as his mother. I, for myself, place no teacher in the same class 
with my mother. I remember two men teachers that I went to — 
I went to a mixed school composed of both boys and girls. I re- 
member very distinctly of having one man teacher, who 

The Mayor: You place them in the same class with your 
father? (Laughter.) 

Speaker (continuing) : Your Honor, sir, I place the men 
teachers as men — they have an influence which is most important 
over the youths. This reminds me of a time — I am willing, per- 
fectly willing to answer a direct question, and I think that a man 
teacher is an essential — in the lives of the youth of to-day 

I remember a distinct occasion when I had a man teacher who 
did the work which a woman teacher could not do for me — it was 
not in the City of New York, I admit, very likely on account of 
the lines they have to-day. 

On the idea of discipline, it is absolutely necessary that there 
should be men teachers, as I think that is one of the great as- 
sistance to the women teachers which should not be considered too 
lightly.^ 

Inevitabl}', the young man of to-day in schools, getting his early 
school training, needs the influence he gets bunking up against a 
man who is able to answer questions in a way a woman cannot. 
The uses of the men in the public schools are therefore more than 
simply to teach from books ; the younger generation is training them 
up to feel that usefulness. They expect to be something more 
than what they are when they leave school. There are many 
branches of business open to them that are not open to the female. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 359 

A girl that is turned out from our schools to-day is fitted for a 
teacher and nothing else, but a man when he has grown up, he has 
many professions open to him — he may be mayor of the City of 
New York — do not understand me. Your Honor, that I mean any 
discredit, but I am simply mentioning the many activities of life 
which are open to a young man and which should have some other 
inspiration other than the women teachers in his younger days. 

Another thing, a woman teacher may teach the boy so he can 
say " Good-morning," " Good-night," " Good-by," " I hope you will 
come again," " Am glad to meet you, glad to know you," and 
many of those little polite phrases, but show me the boy that has 
been taught by a woman teacher and knows enough and has man- 
ners enough, and knows how to act in going into a public office 
and applying for a position, knows how to address himself to a 
prospective employer, knows how to do a thousand and one things 
that a man can teach that a woman cannot. I mention that so as to 
illustrate why there should be men teachers whereby the boys may 
have some one to go to to get the information which they really 
need, which cannot be supplied by the excellent work of the lady- 
teachers. I say the New York schools need the men teachers. I 
have taught besides two years in New York, three years in other 
States, and know something about the conditions that exist here and 
elsewhere. 

IN SENATE ON MAYOR'S VETO OF WHITE BILL, 1907 

Senator Grady: — There is a wonderful deal of misinformation 
floating about concerning this bill, and as suggested by the Senator 
of the 38th (Senator White), it proceeds from the men teachers 
who up to the present time have had their full and sufficient 
salaries, but who are little in fear that if this bill passes that full- 
ness and sufficiency will not be increased to overflowing. 

Now let us go back a little while, before 1900, when the legisla- 
ture commenced, at the request of the men who oppose this bill — 
understand that — at the request of the men who oppose this bill — • 
when the state first undertook to regulate the salaries of the 
teachers in the City of New York. Prior to that time there was in 
Brooklyn no distinction as to the salary paid to male or to women 
teachers. The salary went with the position, and there was no dis- 
tinction whatever made on account of sex up to that time. 

Now that did not suit an organization then existing on the part 
of the men teachers. They came to the legislature and they asked 
the legislature first to provide a definite fixed sum that must be 
appropriated from the budget to the uses of the Department of 
Education; and they fixed that sum at four mills. That was the 
provision of the original law, that four mills of our annual taxa- 
tion should be given to the Board of Education. To do what? 
To meet the mandatory provisions of the law which fixed the 



36o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

minimum salary for their position, which fixed the annual incre- 
ment, and which determined the number of years in which the 
maximum should be reached. And I want to say in reply to the 
suggestion of His Honor, the Mayor of the City of New York, 
that if this bill should be defeated, the effect of that defeat would 
be to leave upon our statute books in full force a measure which 
is much more mandatory in its character than the measure now 
before the Senate, and if it was not for the high character of the 
mayor, I would charge him with bad faith in urging, as one of his 
objections, that the bill was mandatory in form. 

The mayor then tells you that another objection — and by the 
way, remember that there is not in the mayors message a single 
original idea. I can take the speech made by Mr. Harrison, and 
the speech made by Abraham Stern before the Committee of Cities, 
and pick out line for line every word contained in the message of 
His Honor, the Mayor. I do not say the mayor did not write his 
message, but I do say he compiled it from the speeches made be- 
fore the Assembly Committee on Cities by two opponents of the 
bill. Now that is a fact. 

What is the situation we are dealing with? By this mandatory 
bill now in operation, every provision of which was suggested by 
the men teachers, they have $goo a year to start with and $105 of 
annual increment, with a maximum salary of $2160. Now they 
decided that $900 was the lowest sum that should be paid to a male 
teacher; but when they came to deal with the women teachers 
they said: "She can get along on $600; and she doesn't need any 
such liberal increase as $105 annually; she would not know what to 
do with the money; so we will make her increment in the way of 
salary $40 annually as against our $105." 

Now what is the position of those who favor passing this bill 
notwithstanding the objection of the mayor? They start out with 
the proposition that there should be no teacher, man or woman, in 
the public schools working for $11 a week. If there is any man 
that believes that $11 a week is proper compensation for a teacher 
in the public schools, man or woman, let him vote to sustain the 
mayor. 

We do not believe it is, and as compared with salaries paid in 
any union free-school district of the State of New York, in pro- 
portion to expenses of living, this $600 is the meanest salary paid 
to any school teacher in the State of New York. We believe that 
at least $720 should be paid to any teacher, and we have not dis- 
turbed the minimum sum for the men from $900. 

Now you have heard from Mr you have had 

pamphlets sent to you just as I have — that this bill only provided 
for increase of the compensation of the highest class of women 
teachers. That is a statement that was intended to prejudice you 
against the bill. But we had in this bill, as the Chairman of the 
Cities Committee knows, put in at the suggestion of the women, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 361 

a provision that 661% of all money paid for salaries, should be 
given to the teachers below the grade of 7 A. But that was stricken 
out, not at the suggestion of the women, but stricken out at the 
suggestion that it involved too great a strain upon the discretion 
of the Board of Education. 

Now the Senator from the asked if we ever knew 

a Board of Education to pay any lieed to the suggestions of the 
teachers. I have known such. Make your Board of Education 
responsive to the people and they will give heed. We have a 
Board of Education that cannot be reached, and if they could be 
reached they would be scourged from their places long since. 

What is the truth about it? One year ago last February the 
women organized, just as the men teachers had organized long 
before; and exercising the greatest diligence that was possible 
from February, 1906, to February, 1907, they succeeded in inter- 
viewing many Commissioners and in securing a hearing by the 
Board. But this hearing was attended by only two of the whole 
Board of 46. , . . 

Do you ask us to leave this matter with the Board of Education? 
■ — By defeating this bill you do not do it. Yes, but by repealing 
the Davis bill you do. Can you repeal that bill? I would like 
to see the phalanx of male teachers that would come up here in 
opposition to a proposition to repeal the Davis law. The Davis 
bill is their bonanza. They never have complained of the Davis 
bill nor will those who are on duty twenty-four hours after judg- 
ment day complain of it. That is the trouble with our Honorable 
Mayor — and if I do not lay sufficient emphasis upon the Honorable 
it is not my fault. H'e asks you just what the men principals and 
teachers ask you; just what Mr. Stern and Mr. Harrison of the 
Board of Education ask you. He asks you to let the Davis bill 
alone and allow the advantage to continue with the men. 

Now suppose that the defeat of this bill did relegate the matter 
to the Board of Education, it would simply leave in force a much 
more mandatory enactment. The Board of Education from 1900 
had the power to adjust these salaries. The Board of Education 
could have made the s^alary of every woman teacher more nearly 
the salary of the men teachers; the Board of Education knew 
it could not be justified either in economy or in morals that a 
woman teacher should have $40 annual increase and the men 
teachers $105 ; and it knew that the maximum salary for men 
teachers in grades superintended by women was greater than 
that paid to the superintendent over them. All these wrongs and 
injustices have been known to the Board of Education for seven 
years, and yet not a single move was made by them to adjust or 
correct the wrong. Not a single step was taken by them; and 
that statement cannot be successfully contradicted. But now at 
the fifty-ninth minute of the twelfth hour the Board of Education 
says: "We asked the women teachers and the men teachers 



Z62 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

to leave the matter with us, and they refused; they insisted that 
they were fighting for a principle of equal pay for equal v>/^ork, and 
this principle they would not relinquish." 

When the Board of Education asked that the matter be left 
with them they knew what the women teachers knew, and what 
the men teachers ought to have known, namely: that leaving the 
matter with them, under the existing law, permits them no dis- 
cretion except to improve the condition of the women teachers — 
and to do that they have had seven years time; and yet during 
those seven years they did not address themselves to that question; 
and now in the face of legislation almost unanimously adopted 
by both chambers of the legislature they come and tell you that 
they should not be interfered with ; that their discretion should not 
be encroached upon; that the expenses of government would be 
increased beyond measure : as to this latter they know you are 
simply restoring in this bill the four mills fixed in the original 
Davis act. 

I have criticised school expenditures when I thought they were 
excessive, and I expect to be called upon to do so again. I am 
not prepared to say that there might not be great economies worked 
out in our department of education. But I will say this, — and it 
will be proven at the first opportunity there is to prove it, that 
to give justice to the women teachers the citizens of the City of 
New York are willing to be taxed whatever may be required. 
There is no man from Greater New York on this floor, represent- 
ing a constituency that will justify $6oD as the salary of a teacher 
in our public schools. He may think he does, but as soon as that 
can be tested it will be discovered that he does not. If you fail 
to pass this bill over the veto of the Mayor you will leave in 
operation a law that fixes that as ample compensation for the 
women teachers while at the same time it fixes $900 as the 
minimum compensation for the man teacher. 

If this imposes burdens upon the people of the City of New York, 
the cause for which the burden is imposed is one of such complete 
justice that the people will gladly bear the burden. I do not know 
how some of my colleagues think, but you must remember that 
these teachers appealing here to-day for justice are not strangers 
in New York. By every fireside there can be found the boy that 
they taught and the girl that they taught. The parents do not 
have to take this question on suspicion, they have the work of 
the women teachers as evidenced in the education of their children ; 
and they do not believe that there should be the discrimination in 
wages that is maintained by these present schedules — framed, not 
by our local authorities, but by the Davis bill. They do not 
believe it. There is no question of women's suffrage here; there 
is no question of equal rights. There is no question as to whether 
the saleswoman in a dry goods store is paid as much as the male 
salesman; there is no question as to whether the girl who is a 



EQUAU PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 363 

cash girl is paid as much as the cash boy. There is only the 
simple question : Here we are dealing with trained educators — 
and don't make a mistake when you come to consider trained edu- 
cators, for you will find equally brilliant examples among the 
women as you could possibly find among the men — the question 
is whether the trained educator who has taken every step required 
to equip her for the difficulties of her position in teaching a class, 
and in the management of a school, and as the superintendent of 
a district, whether she is because of sex to be penalized under 
the law for part of her salary. That is what is involved in this 
bill, and if you vote to sustain the Mayor you will vote to sustain 
the present law under which men will maintain their advantage 
and the woman teacher will continue to be at a disadvantage; but 
remember that will only be for a very little while. 



IN SENATE : June 3, 1907. 

ORDER OF BUSINESS: Reports of Standing Committees. 

SUBJECT: Message of the Governor, in re Teachers' salary bill. 

Senator Grady: — Mr. President, we are confronted with a most 
unfortunate condition of affairs regarding this most important 
piece of legislation. The reading of the message of the Governor 
discloses that he labors under a very erroneous idea that the 
principle underlying this bill is a novelty in the legislation of this 
State, — that for the first time it is suggested that for work of a 
given position women shall receive equal pay with men; and the 
veto proceeds from the expressed disinclination of the Governor 
to have that important governmental policy adopted by means 
of a local bill applying that principle to a single locality, and in 
that locality to a single element of the Civil Service — the teachers 
in our public schools. 

He suggests to us in this message that instead of the mistaken 
course we have pursued that a policy of such importance should 
be adopted only after further consideration and with reference to 
an application of that principle to both the State and the municipal 
divisions of the State. 

We can only ascribe to the Governor's lack of experience in 
purely governmental affairs, a position so unsound, and the lack 
of information upon which that mistaken opinion rests, to the 
fact that in the five months that he has been at the head of affairs 
in this State, he has not had the opportunity to acquaint himself 
with the details of our governmental policy, else the vote never 
would have issued from the Executive Chamber: for, that for 
work of a given position women shall receive equal pay with men 
is — and it has long been — the policy of the State, the policy con- 
trolling every department of the State, the policy which shapes 



364 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

every appropriation bill which has been presented to you in years; 
for here you will find in a bill making an appropriation for the 
support of government the appropriation going to the petition, re- 
gardless of the sex of the occupant. 

Let the Secretary of State to-day name a woman for his 
Deputy, and under the law of the State the pay of that woman 
in that position is the same as is provided by law for the pay of 
any man who may hold it. Let the Attorney-General name a 
woman as his first or second deputy, and tmder the operation of 
the laws of this State as they are to-day, the pay of that woman 
in that position is precisely the pay given to the man -who now holds 
it. In your appropriation bills you have your stenographers graded, 
and you have your clerks graded, and for these several positions, 
according to grade, there are established schedules of salaries to 
be paid to men and women alike, whoever may hold the position. 
So that in presenting to the Governor a bill which was intended 
in another municipal divison and toward another set of public 
employees, to vindicate this sound principle — that for work of a 
given position women shall receive equal pay with men — we were 
not as the Governor says, proposing to " establish " that proposition, 
but we were proposing to apply a proposition already established 
and vindicated in the State Civil Service, to the greater City of 
New York and to its school teachers. It might have been expected 
that in criticising the principle which we sought to make applicable 
to a local educational department, the Governor would have in- 
quired as to the situation so far as the State Educational Depart- 
ment was concerned. The State Educational Department is a part 
of the Government of this State, and, subject to the general prin- 
ciple which dominates the entire State Government, has in opera- 
tion the very principles which the Governor regards as a novelty, 
namely, that for the work of a given position women shall receive 
equal pay with men. 

Now, what is the situation which this bill sought to meet? This 
bill proposed to rectify two injustices, one of which the Governor 
recognizes, and the other of which he ignores. That you haven't 
equalization of salaries in the Borough of Brooklyn is due not 
to any action taken by that particular constituency. They had 
equalization there up to 1900, and then you passed the Davis bill 
and you destroyed the equalization that they had enjoyed, and under 
which no complaint had ever been made that some novel principle 
was at work in government as far as that Borough was concerned. 
That injustice of the Davis bill the Governor entirely ignores, fail- 
ing to see in what is known as the White bill an attempt to re- 
establish as far as that bill is concerned the equality which the 
Davis bill destroys. 

The other injustice the Governor recognizes and deplores; and 
when I read that part of his message I was reminded of the chonis 
of the popular song: 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 365 

" All I get is sympathy, and it ain't a bit of use to me ; 
When I was broke and hungry my friends all said 
'Don't worry, Bill; there's lots of fish down in the brook; 
All you need is a rod, a line and a hook.' 
Ain't it funny, when you look for money, 
All you get is sympathy." 

He recognizes that there are glaring inequalities which should 
not be permitted to continue; and what is his fatherly advice? 
You will find it in the last paragraph — •" The matter should be 
left to the Board of Education to be dealt with locally as may 
seem best, unless the Legislature is prepared to lay down the 
general principle for the entire State and the entire public service." 

Now, you will understand that for eight years these glaring 
inequalities have existed ; that for eight years these glaring in- 
equalities have been " permitted to continue " ; that ample oppor- 
tunity has been afforded to the Board of Education to put an end 
to them ; that under the original levy of f ovir mills for " the 
general fund " in the Department of Education budget they could 
have equalized the salaries of teachers in all of Greater New York; 
but instead of using the surplus derived from that four mill tax 
for the equalization of salaries, they permitted it to be reduced to 
three mills in order that they might have an excuse for not per- 
forming their duty. 

You will understand that for eight years, eight years spent in 
a constant struggle to restore the equalization which the Davis 
bill destroyed, eight years spent in a fruitless struggle to have the 
salary go with the position rather than with the sex of the 
occupant of the position, that now they are asked to go back 
again to where for eight years they have been denied any sort of 
relief. 

It is true the Governor gives us an alternative; and it is to 
that alternative I propose to address myself, and then to close. 
The alternative is in this language : " Unless the Legislature is 
prepared to lay down the general principle for the entire State 
and the entire public service." This is another way of repeating 
the objection which the Govei'nor urges, that we have undertaken 
to deal with the matter by a local rather than by a general bill. — • 
to use the precise words of the Executive, " There is no reason 
why the principle should be applied to teachers in New York and 
not to those in Albany, Syracuse, Rochester, Buff^alo and elsewhere 
in the State." 

Now, is the Governor sound in that? Are Albany, S3Tacuse, 
Rochester, Buffalo and the other municipalities subjected to the 
operation of the same principle in educational matters as obtains 
in New York? 

Let us see ! The Legislature in its wisdom has applied to 
Greater New York the unique principle of commanding its citizens 



366 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

to raise annually for the general educational fund such a sum as 
a tax of three mills upon every dollar of real and personal estate 
within that municipality — three mills upon, every dollar liable 
to taxation within Greater New York. 

Here is a distinct principle at work, applying exclusively to 
Greater New York, not shared in by either Albany, Syracuse, 
Rochester or Buffalo. And then the State has gone further, and 
it has prescribed for New York City and for New York City 
alone of all the municipal divisions of the State, the minimum 
salaries that shall be paid to teachers, men and women, and the 
maximum, and the number of years in which the maximum should 
be reached. So it cannot be for a moment argued that the Legis- 
lature having created this inequality by the application of two 
distinct principles to this particular constituency, cannot redress 
the inequality it has thus created unless it establishes an inequality 
for all. It is a plausible argument, as has been said. As an ab- 
stract proposition it may be sound; but we know in its practical 
application it is not entitled to a moment's consideration. We 
can point the Governor to one hundred laws on the statute books 
applicable to New York and New York City alone, establishing, 
regulating and continuing for that constituency a condition de- 
fended because of the peculiar character of that community and 
because of the peculiar circumstances that surround such a com- 
munity. 

But with greater force it has been said that if you are not 
going to address yourself to this question at all until you are 
prepared to deal with it as a whole, why then you have secured 
an indefinite postponement of the entire matter. 

The Governor is not so well acquainted with affairs around and 
about the Capital as I thought he was, when he suggests for a 
matter of this importance " that the consideration of such a 
matter should be under circumstances directing the attention of 
every Member of the Legislature to its importance, with reference 
to his own constituency and to the State at large, and not upon 
the assumption that it is a question of purely local concern." 

No one has ever claimed it was a question of purely local con- 
cern. No one who has addressed an argument in favor of the 
passage of this bill has ever suggested it was a question of local 
concern. It certainly did not lack any consideration when on this 
the 3rd of June we are discussing the message vetoing the work 
which began with the introduction of the bill on the 6th of last 
February. The measure was heard in public hearing before the 
Senate Committee on Cities ; twice was it heard in public hearing 
before the Assembly Committee on Cities. Nor was that all : for 
after the difficulty and the perplexities of the situation, the possi- 
bility of injustice and the necessity for an absolutely equitable 
treatment of the question was made apparent, the Chairman of 
our Senate Cities Committee, not trusting even to his own ex- 




Hon. William A. Prendergast, 
Comptroller of the City of New York. 
Speaker at "Equal Pay" Mass 



OF 

Meeting, 



March 6, 1908. 



'EQUAIj pay. for equal work 367 

perience, not satisfied with the embodiment of his own views, not 
willing that it should be taken simply as a measure, the friends 
or the opponents of which were to be satisfied; but regarding 
it as of immense importance to the educational interests which 
affect at least one-half of the State, brought to his assistance 
the best minds that he could consult and the best talent procurable. 
At the expenditure of days of his time outside of this Chamber 
and after official cares should have fallen from him, he then pre- 
pared what I am glad to have called "The White Bill." Not 
that I would detract one iota from the credit that belongs to the 
Senator from the 7th and to the Honored Member of the Assembly 
who originally introduced this bill; but I am glad to have it 
called "The White Bill," for it represents the best efforts of the 
directing force of our Committee on Cities; and he need not be 
ashamed to have his name attached to that measure of justice; 
and I hope it shall live to be his monument. 

But, better yet, there never was a whiter bill presented to the 
Legislature of this State, whiter in the justice which it attempted 
to do to all; whiter in the character of those in whose behalf it 
was largely urged. 

I hope no friend of the measure is either disheartened or dis- 
mayed. If a campaign of education is necessary upon the next 
floor we can have it there as well as we have had it on this floor 
since February last. 

The principle underlying this bill is simple justice, simple justice 
itself, namely: "that for the work of a given position" — again 
to adopt the language of the Governor — "women shall receive 
equal pay with men." That is the principle at stake; that and that 
only is the principle to be vindicated; and the struggle for it will 
never end until it is written in the statute books of this State, not 
as now, applying to every State Department; not as now, applying 
to the State Educational System; but until it finds its place in the 
statutes of the State, there to testify to the sense of fairness, there 
to testify to the sense of justice, and there to vindicate the in- 
telligence, of the entire State. 

There may be a temporary set-back to our hopes and to our 
ambitions in this regard. We may yet have to chase the miserable 
pretext by which we are met in seeking the vindication of a great 
principle, that in private employment men can take advantage of 
the needs of the applicant for any place; that there are conditions 
in the labor market whereby you can extract from a man $12. of 
work for $8. ; that generally speaking the women who seek private 
employment are those whose needs require to be immediately satis- 
fied in order that their honor may be protected and their homes 
preserved; and that with such classes it may be possible for some 
employing wolf to discriminate between what the wage earner is 
entitled to and what her necessities will com.pel her to receive. 
But why take such illustrations with which to meet the unassail- 



368 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

able and well established principle, as far as this State is concerned, 
that for the work of a given position the pay of women shall be 
the same as men, and the pay of men shall be the same as the pay 
of women. For one whose heart is bound up in the vindication 
of this just principle in order that the worthiness of every father 
and every husband and every son and brother of the mothers and 
the wives and the sisters of the land may be proven, I am willing 
to watch and wait ; and to that struggle I promise the best effort 
of whatever of public life may be left to me. 

SPEECHES AT MASS MEETING— COOPER UNION 

January 30, 1908. 

Presiding, John Francis Harrison. 

Address by Senator Patrick H. McCarren: 

Ladies and Gentlemen : My appearance here this evening would 
seem to be something like an effort on my part to reaffirm my 
allegiance to the cause. I assume that there is no necessity for me 
to say that I am as loyal to the cause that has brought this large 
audience here to-night, as I ever have been. (Applause.) And to 
repeat what the last speaker has said, I am of the opinion that 
ultimately the cause will triumph, because I believe that the cause 
is of that character so often referred to and so graphically de- 
scribed by Shakespeare — it is one that is thrice armed, because it 
is a just one. 

There are two features in connection with the bill which was 
passed by the last Legislature, and which I understand will be 
introduced this year, substantially the same. The two features 
are the question, in the first place, of the principle of home rule, 
and the other feature is the question of the right of the female 
teacher to receive, when she performs the same work, the same 
wages that a male teacher receives for performing the identical 
work. 

Now with reference to the question of home rule. I have been 
chided by many of the opponents of the bill for the seeming in- 
consistency in my attitude. I have always been regarded as a 
home ruler. And I have been moved to put forth my best efforts 
in the cause of home rule in my occupation as a legislator, because 
I have been obliged to confront the efforts of my Republican 
opponents in the Legislature to divest our community of its 
right to govern itself. Now I have stood conspicuously for the 
principle of home rule. And a few evenings ago I was brought 
to task by the Superintendent of Schools, Mr. Maxwell, who 
happened to be at a dinner where I was, and commenting on what 
I had said, he called the attention of the audience to my incon- 
sistent attitude in my fathering of the so-called equal pay bill, 
and my insistence on the right of the City to govern itself, and 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 369 

my advocacy of the greatest amount of latitude in the City for the 
government of itself. Now that is a sort of specious argument. 
It is necessary to understand the origin of the so-called Davis 
law, which now governs our educational system in the City of New 
York. After a great deal of agitation, and after a considerable 
effort on the part of the legislators to frame such a bill as would 
bring about an equality of conditions, and a maximum of satisfac- 
tion, the so-called Davis law was framed and passed by the 
Legislature, and since its passage it has been practically in opera- 
tion with very few slight changes. Now you want to bear in 
mind that the Legislature took to itself the power to regulate the 
salaries of the teachers in the City of New York, and in most all 
of the other Departments of the City government. Under recent 
amendments to the Charter, the City government is given the right 
to regulate the wages of its employees. But it is as specifically 
provided that the wages of the employees in the public school 
system shall be regulated by a State Act. 

Now, inasmuch as there is no possibility of the entire repeal of 
the Davis law, there is no other way in which you can accomplish 
the purpose which you have in view, except by an amendment to 
the Davis law. So that, in order to accomplish the purpose of the 
school teachers and the friends of the school teachers who believe 
in their cause, it is necessary to amend the Davis law. Now some- 
times a man may appear to be inconsistent, but his inconsistency 
at the time is the only way in which he can be consistent. (Ap- 
plause.) If the opponents of the bill, or those who contend against 
the purpose of the teachers, would advocate the entire repeal of 
the Davis law, and give to the local authorities the right to fix the 
minimum and the maximum salaries, and the schedules in be- 
tween, why, there might be some consistency, and there might 
be some force, in their position. But they insist on the retention 
of the Davis law, and oppose the proposition to amend it. So for 
that reason, the man who charges a proponent of the teachers' 
bill with inconsistency can be said to be more inconsistent himself. 
(Applause.) For that reason I feel that I am justified in my atti- 
tude in favoring the bill that has been put forth in the interest 
of the teachers. 

I think that on the principle of equality, on the principle of 
equity, on the principle of justice, and on every other principle 
that appeals to the fairness in the composition of every individual, 
it must be admitted that where the female teacher does the same 
work that the male teacher does, she is entitled to the same com- 
pensation for her work. (Applause.) . . . WIe are con- 
fronted at the outset of the attempt this year to pass the bill in 
the Legislature and have it become a law, with the fact that we 
have in the Executive Chamber the same Governor that we had 
last year. There is no vs^ay in which we can change the Governor. 
(Laughter.) I mean by that, there is no w^y in which we can 



370 EQUAL PAY, FOR EQUAL WORK 

change his personality. There is a possibility of changing his 
mind. Now, of course, we know that Governors are liable to 
change their minds and political exigencies make almost every man 
in public office occasionally change his mind. (Great laughter.) 

There may be some doubt about the force that might be brought 
into play to bring about a change of mind, inasmuch as we are 
dealing with non-voters. (Laughter.) But be that as it may, 
it seems to me that the position of the Governor last year was 
somewhat untenable, his argument against the bill being substan- 
tially one of justification on the theory that it was a local measure, 
and did not affect all the territory within our commonwealth. It 
seems to me this argument is one that cannot be maintained with 
that force and with that justice with which an argument should 
be equipped when it is intended to bring about the defeat of such 
a measure as Governor Hughes vetoed. 

Now, many instances might be cited to show the inconsistency 
of the Governor. The Governor favored, and I suppose he had 
in his own mind good reasons for favoring, the proposition to 
pass and place upon the statute books the so-called " Public Utilities 
Bill." The principle of that bill, it seems to me, is just as repug- 
nant to the mind of a man who is in favor of home rule as is 
the principle embodied in the teachers' bill. The public utilities 
bill provides that the City of New York, in the matter of the 
treatment of the Commission in the so-called first division, shall 
be mulcted to the extent of $1,250,000 per year for the expenses 
of that commission. Now, the Governor is not a local official, he 
is a State officer; and yet the Governor is responsible for the 
proposition that that sort of an act shall be passed and that sort 
of a burden shall be placed on the people of the City of New 
York, notwithstanding the fact that the local authorities have 
had no hand or part in the fixing of the salaries, or the amount 
of money that the people of the City of New York must annually 
pay for these officials. (Applause.) 

It seems to me that inasmuch as nearly all the representatives 
of the City of New York in the Legislature in both branches were 
substantially in favor of the Teachers' Bill, that it might be said 
that the local authorities are in favor of the principles involved 
in the bill. As to whether the Governor will take another view of 
the bill or not, I cannot say, I am not in a position to speak for 
the Governor (laughter) ; but I want to say that I believe the bill 
will receive the same favorable consideration at the hands of the 
Legislature this year that it received last year. (Great applause.) 

Now in this busy life that we are obliged to lead, whether we 
will or not, it is well for us to economize time. Time is moneys 
no matter how many people may believe that it is not — time is 
money, and time can be saved by the friends of this measure if 
they will bring all their influence to bear upon the Governor and 
if they will busy themselves in the work of convincing the Governor 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 371 

that he was wrong. In order to economize time and in order to 
direct your efforts, so that they will have the most beneficial 
results, and so that they will bring to you the greatest amount 
of satisfaction, it is always best to know at the outset at what 
particular spot you should aim, so as to accomplish your purpose ; 
and the purpose of the friends of this bill should be to bring, as 
I say, all the influence that can be brought to bear upon the one 
man who stood between the teachers and consummation of their 
object. That is, it seems to me, the work that you have in hand, 
and that is the direction in which your efforts should go. 

I can only say to you that so far as the friends of the bill in the 
Senate of last year are concerned, that it can be safely said there 
will be no question at all about their attitude; and assuming that 
there will be very few changes, if any, in the bill, that the bill will 
speedily pass the upper branch of the Legislature. I want to as- 
sure you all that whatever efforts may be necessary to put forth 
in whatever work the teachers may think necessary to do, will be 
done by the friends of the bill in the Legislature of this year as 
cheerfully, and as happily and I think as victoriously, as last year. 
(Applause.) 

Address of Senator Thomas F. Grady 

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : You will see with what 
a regard for the eternal fitness of things the ladies manage. It 
was necessary that someone should stay up as late as this, and they 
made up their minds that it was more in line with my usual hour. 
(Laughter and applause.) My presence here is to inspire you 
with confidence that the justice of your cause is bound to triumph, 
and to regard such adversity as we have met with in the struggle 
as more of accident than design. In the few remarks that I ad- 
dressed to my associates of the Senate upon the subject of the 
Governor's veto of the bill, my enthusiasm betrayed me into what 
I was afterwards convinced was a mis-statement, and I may say 
that that is not an unusual thing with me at all. (Laughter.) I 
charged that the Governor had not investigated the question. I 
have since discovered that he did ; and now I am forced to take 
the other position that he was misled. He was misled into sup- 
posing that he was dealing zvith a bill that provides the same 
salaries for similar zvork, whereas he was dealing with a bill 
that provides the same salaries for identical zvork. (Laughter.) 
. The policy of the State as embodied in every appropri- 
ation bill, is that the salary shall go to the position and not to the 
person occupying it; and every position in our State Civil Service 
to-day under the law pays to women precisely the same salary 
as it pays to men in that identical position. 

The governor was misled, I believe, when it was shown to him 
that women nurses in women's hospitals did not get the same pay 
as men nurses in men's hospitals, and that women keepers in 



^•72 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

women's prisons did not receive as high pay as men keepers in 
men's prisons ; and that you will see is as wide of the question as 
it is possible for one to go. There can never be men keepers in 
women's prisons with any degree of success, and there would be 
no great ambition on the part of women to fill places as keepers 
in men's prisons. The positions are not interchangeable; there is 
no succession of grade; so that while I give to the governor credit 
as he deserves, because he is a busy man, a little more busy this 
3?ear than he was last (applause), while I give to him credit, I still 
maintain the position — and I maintain it not with reference to this 
bill alone — I still maintain the position that so far as the State of 
New York has adopted any policy, it has been one of absolute 
equality for man and woman in the public service. 

And then again, as Mr. Deming so clearly explained, the sugges- 
tion which the governor made that this great boon should not 
come to New York until we were ready to give it to all of the 
State — tve are ready to give it to anyone who asks for it. I make 
that proposition now, and although it takes Conklin to tell you 
what is going to be done, I am the best authority in Albany for 
what is not going to be done; and I say to you that no application 
from any locality to establish equality of pay for identity of serv- 
ice in any part of the public service will be refused by the legis- 
lature. 

Now remember that when the governor wrote his message, there 
were but two first-class cities in the State of New York — Buffalo 
and New York; and to-day Bufi^alo, without a legislative enact- 
ment, pays the salary for the positions. I have myself a very de- 
cided feeling as to what I regard as the unwarranted extension of 
the veto power. It was never so deeply impressed upon my mind 
as last j^ear when all my bills were vetoed. (Laughter.) I want 
to suggest in all seriousness to the governor that there is no purpose 
in this meeting of antagonism to anybody. We have a higher aim 
than antagonizing the governor, or opposing the Board of Educa- 
tion or paj'-ing our respects or want of respect to our male op- 
ponents of last year. 

We are here in the cause of justice, and being engaged in that 
cause, we have a right to believe we can convince any fair-minded 
man that lives, that he ought to be with us. I would like to ask 
when it was considered a part of the executive power not to re- 
view, but to defy the legislative mandate. What becomes of the 
division of the departments of government, if when you pass a 
bill against the justice of which not one word can be said, about 
the constitutionality of which there is no question, but which is 
advocated in the very message of the governor himself, I want 
to ask, when you come to such extension of the veto power, that 
a governor can write across the act of Senate and Assembly, 
simply because he does not like the way in which it was donef 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 373 

Not for the reason that we have been discriminated against in a 
thousand other ways, but for the special reasons concerned and 
connected with this question, do we have a right to ask that this 
be made a special case. 

Did the governor realize that it was the bill which we sought to 
amend that destroyed the equality that had always obtained as 
between men and women teachers in the Borough of Brooklyn 
(applause) ? That for years in that Borough, the salary went to 
the position, regardless of the sex of the individual holding it? 
That it was the Davis bill and what followed under it that de- 
stroyed that absolute equality, and that we have an absolute right 
to seek by amendment to that particular act to remedy the injustice 
that it works? If that is not so, then I have a very poor knowl- 
edge of what legislation ought to be and how it can be accom- 
plished. / am not looking for the veto of the governor this year 
(great applause), because in so far as it is possible to meet his 
views without compromising the principle involved, every friend 
of this bill is prepared to go to the utmost limit (applause). But 
let there be now or hereafter no compromise as to the principle 
(applause). There shall be no compromise as to the principle, 
because there can be none without an injustice that means, not the 
settlement of the great question, but its treament in the most 
vexatious manner possible. 

I want to assure you that you have not lost a friend among the 
members of either House of the Legislature. (Applause.) There 
is, of course, a feeling of loyalty on the part of those identified 
with the executive, which makes them hesitate in taking any posi- 
tion towards which he may have expressed opposition. But can 
there be any question as to the governor's duty in the premises? 
Not that I am in a position to tell the governor as to his duties. 
(Laughter.) In his veto he said that he was confident that the 
Board of Education would correct the present existing glaring in- 
equalities and he committed us to their tender care. I expressed 
som.e doubt as to what would happen. Well, the Board of Edu- 
cation addressed itself to the " glaring inequalities " {from gov- 
ernor's message), and found they had no more power to correct 
them than we had, that they might recommend, but that that did 
not produce the coin; and that a board which made no pretension 
whatever as educators in the strict and narrow sense, must pass 
upon the question as to whether it would be a good thing or a bad 
thing for our schools to have teachers in the same position receive 
the same pay. After giving us that long journey for nothing, when 
we come to the governor and say, " We have tried your plan and it 
did not work," would it not seem as if for a year at least, he would 
try our plan. (Great applause.) Not only have we suffered from 
that inconvenience, but see the position in which we find ourselves 
to-night — the Board of Education passes a resolution that the 



374 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

teachers shall not go to Albany, and as a consequence we have to 
bring Albany down here. (Great laughter and applause.) 

I want to say while some of us are down here not entirely upon 
the business before the House, that there is no journey so long or 
so difUcult, but that a majority of the legislature will take it, in 
order, as was suggested, that the chivalry of the manhood of this 
imperial state may be vindicated. (Applause.) I mean just that. 
// the zvomen received more salary than the men, I could Und an 
excuse for it, but I tell you it takes away something from a man's 
dignity as a citizen and it adds an element of meanness to a man's 
position as a legislator, when he faces a condition in which injustice 
is worked against and upon the women folk, and he must stand 
with arms folded unable to offer any assistance or to redress the 
grievance under which they suffer. 

As an indication of the dignity of the manhood of the state, I 
would have such law as may be necessary passed now to correct 
the wrong — and that is the word I came here to speak to-night. 
Do not weary of the contest; there cannot be a doubt among you 
of ultimate success — those to whom you have entrusted your in- 
terests in the official positions in your association are capable, and 
better than that, unselfish, and better than that, devoted, and what- 
ever may be your experience, standing together in the might and 
in the majesty of the influence which 13,000 good women command 
in any cause, you just stand up for your principle until it is a part 
of the law of your state. I believe the relief will come this year. 
(Applause.) 

Now as I said to you, every effort will be made by those who are 
interested in your work to promote the bill, amend the bill, fix the 
bill — of course you don't know what that means — so that it may 
receive the executive sanction; but I have only to repeat the words 
of that experienced statesman and politician, as he himself would 
have me call him, Senator McCarren, that the important work is 
to get all the influence we can upon the governor now. We may 
not be able to reach him as handily in a little while. 

It is most appropriate that this meeting should be held in this 
hall, the gift of one of the best friends, if not the best friend, that 
education ever had in this land, Peter Cooper; a hall in which all 
the great meetings of our citizens have been held — meetings to in- 
spire enthusiasm and courage in the cause of the Union and defense 
of the flag; meetings to protest against the injustice which has 
been worked against our fellows in other climes and under other 
governments; meetings intended to be productive of the better- 
ment of social political conditions in our own metropolis — but 
never in all times has it held a meeting more worthy of the hall 
than the meeting it holds to-night. (Applause.) Never was cause 
more justly proclaimed from this platform, and never was cause 
more worthy of success than this cause, and of its ultimate suc- 
cess there can be no doubt. (Applause.) 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 375 



Address by Hon. Robert S. Conklin, Member of Assembly 

There is one sort of political proposition on which we all can 
agree, and that is, that it was of great value to the teachers and 
to the community at large for the teachers last year to come into 
such close contact with the various departments of government, 
both municipal and state. I do not suppose, since the organization 
of the schools in New York City, that the teaching staff has had 
such a thorough comprehension of civil government as administered 
in the city and in the state as it has to-day. That was good, and 
it was valuable at that time because of this — that there has been 
a noticeable tendency on the part of the American people during 
the last score of years to lose confidence in the legislative depart- 
ment of their government, and to belittle it, and to insist that it 
shall be subservient to the executive. 

Last year confidence in the legislative department of the govern- 
ment reached its lowest ebb. You could scarcely hear a good word 
for the legislature anywhere. It was the executive in both the 
state and the nation that commanded the people's confidence; and 
I say that at such a time as that, if nothing else came of this prop- 
osition, it was an excellent thing for the teachers — the trainers of 
the children, the educators of the future voters, to learn at first 
hand the spirit of earnestness and conscientiousness, of justice 
and integrity that pervades legislative halls. 

I have here the report of the Charter Revision Commission of 
1907. "The so-called Davis law, which fixes mandatorily the 
minimum salaries and annual increases to be paid to the super- 
vising and teaching staffs of the Board of Education, should be 
repealed, as should all other mandatory provisions relating to ap- 
propriations for and expenses of the Board of Education. This 
recommendation is made, not because the Commission objects to 
the schedule of salaries fixed in the Davis law, or because it does 
not believe that there should be suitable and ample provision for 
paying the expenses of the Board of Education. On the contrary, 
it is convinced that the element of certainty in the schedule of 
salaries should not be contravened. This recommendation is made, 
however, because the Commission believes that all of such matters 
should be regulated by the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. 
In other words, that the principle of home rule should be applied 
to the management of this department in no less degree than to 
the management of every other department of the city government." 

It is seen from this that the Board of Education is still a 
separate and distinct entity, over which the city exercises practically 
no control — there is no fault found with that — but in another place 
is a statement to the effect that the principle of home rule should 
be applied to this matter in no less degree than in the other. 

They attempt to justify their position on home rule. I am a 



376 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

home ruler, the same as my Democratic friend who preceded me. 
T believe thoroughly in home rule. I had almost forgotten that 
there is a justification for state control 'of teachers' salaries in 
ancient history. Here it is: "The Emperor Grattan, in 306 A. 
D., established a fixed schedule for teachers throughout the Em- 
pire. While professional chairs in these schools were filled for the 
most part through election of the municipal government, some 
were appointed direct through Emperor Julian, he claiming the 
right to fill all appointments." There is surely a worthy precedent. 
Now, I am going to sum up this home rule proposition so far as 
I am concerned in as few words as possible. In the country and 
smaller cities the training of the child is in the charge of a trinity, 
the home and the church and the school, and each bears its burden 
well. In New York City, unfortunately, in many districts, this 
trinity — is three in one — and that one is the school — the duties that 
are administered by the clergyman, by the parent in other cities, 
too often fall in this great city where the home and the church is 
so much neglected, upon the teacher; and she not only becomes 
a teacher, but she shoulders the burden of moral guidance, and of 
the parent as well. 

Now, New York is the great gateway of the nation. Into it pour 
the immigrants from every land, and it is of vital importance, not 
alone to the municipality, but to the state and nation as well, that 
these children immigrants should be well taken care of. Why, it 
is the teacher that takes these children of the tenements and lets 
into their souls the only light that their poor stunted childhood 
shall ever know. (Great applause.) It is because this proposition 
in New York City is so much broader than it is in any other 
city, that even though we did concede, which we do not concede, 
that education in those cities was a matter to be administered solely 
by the local authorities, we could not concede that in this city, 
where the welfare of the young is of such vital importance to the 
state and to the nation, that New York City alone should have the 
right as to what should be done with these children and what 
should be done with the trainers of these children. 

Now what shall the harvest be? We don't know just how these 
salaries are going to be administered. They tell us that New 
York City is poor — poverty-stricken. (Laughter.) Well, it is a 
matter of grave concern. The city budget we have seen advance 
in the last ten years from $70,000,000 to $143,000,000. New York 
City is the prodigal son among the municipalities of the country. 
Because it is a prodigal son, though it has some just debts, there 
is no reason why those just debts should not be paid. That is 
what we are trying to do — make the city, prodigal son as it is, pay 
its just debts. 

I can say what some of the other gentlemen possibly will not 
venture to say: One of my reasons for advocating this is, that 
the City of New York during the last ten years has been increasing 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 2>77 

salaries. It has exhibited an enthusiasm over the advancement o£ 
salaries in every department except the Department of Education. 
In many cases — and we noted them — has the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment advanced salaries in various other city depart- 
ments recklessly and w^ithout regard for the just deserts of those 
who received the advance. Now, when this goes on year after 
year, it must some time or other reach a limit, and some time or 
another it is proper for the legislature to take notice of it and 
to say, that if the City of New York shall raise and shall spend 
millions annually in salary increases, that all of those salary in- 
creases shall not go to those whose principal claim upon them is 
the fact that they are voters, but that some proportion of it shall 
go to those who if they are not voters, are trainers of future voters. 
(Applause). 

I don't know what is going to become of the bill. I hope for the 
best this year. But those of us, while we may differ sometimes 
as to ways and means to bring about a result, those of us who have 
given this subject careful, earnest, studious consideration, are all 
united upon this one proposition anyway — that we hope sooner or 
later that you will be victorious whatever methods you may pursue; 
and in your fight, the fight that we are waging for you and the 
fight that you are waging on your own behalf, we wish you God- 
speed. (Great applause.) 

Address by Hon. James A. Donnelly, Deputy Attorney-General 

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is not mere gallantry 
which actuates me to declare that my presence here to-night affords 
me the utmost satisfaction and the keenest pleasure. The only 
alma mater I ever knew is the public school. Whatever regard 
for learning I possess was instilled in me by the women teachers 
who directed my youthful energies, and I should be worse than 
ungrateful indeed if I neglected the opportunity which this oc- 
casion affords me of paying my poor tribute to those who are 
laboring so earnestly and so faithfully to make our public school 
system successful. (Applause.) 

When this republic was established among the nations of the 
earth, it was confidently predicted by its enemies that the new 
experiment in government based upon the equality of all before the 
law, must inevitably end in disappointment and failure. Govern- 
ment, contended those wiseacres, was a matter which required 
special skill; it could never be successfully conducted by permitting 
the uneducated rabble to share in its functions. The history of 
our country for the past century and a quarter gives the lie to 
those gloomy prophecies. The idea which infected the founders 
of this republic has been realized. But common candor compels the 
statement that the lofty purposes by which they were animated, 
must indeed have ended in disappointment and failure, if it had not 



378 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

been for the work performed by the public schools of America. 
(Applause.) Nearly two centuries ago there was published in 
England, a pamphlet, one sentence of which is enough to entitle it 
to enduring fame, for in that sentence there is to be found the 
most sensible expression of political philosophy that has ever pro- 
ceeded from the mind of man. It was written by that eccentric 
genius Jonathan Swift. Swift's literary fame is more fairly es- 
tablished than his reputation for statesmanship, and yet, about a 
half a century before Thomas Jefferson gave to the world his im- 
mortal Declaration of Independence, the dean of St. Patrick's was 
urging that that government that did not derive its powers from 
the consent of the governed was the very definition and essence 
of slavery. 

The framers of the American Constitution were not merely 
patriots inspired by love of their own country, having builded not 
merely for their own generation, but for all ages to come. And 
they observed that there would be erected upon this continent a 
government dedicated to the principle of the equality of all before 
the law; a government which should be an inspiration and encour- 
agement to the oppressed of all time to come. And the history 
of this country amply attests the wisdom of the establishment of 
that principle. 

The Irishman, bowed down beneath the yoke of oppression that 
has lasted with hateful persistency for over seven centuries, has 
here found a refuge from oppression. The boy driven from pillar 
to post, in this country of ours finds a haven — and an opportunity 
to enjoy the fruits of his industry undisturbed — likewise the Italian, 
the Russian, the man from every clime and from every country, 
fleeing from a government which exacts for the best of their lives 
a term of enlistment in the military service. These foreigners 
speedily become American citizens. And their children are as 
proud of their American nationality as the proudest descendant of 
those who voyaged across the seas in the Mayflower. 

Now and then we hear the voice of the timid urging that immi- 
gration to these shores be restricted ; but I say to those who fear 
for the safety of the Republic if the influx of foreign populations 
to these shores be not restricted or impeded, Democratic institu- 
tions have nothing to fear. If those who entertain that fear will 
go into the public schools of this metropolis any day of the week 
when they are in session, and see the manner in which the women 
teachers are making those children splendid American citizens, 
they will quickly abandon their fears. (Applause.) 

The principle involved in this bill is so simple and so plain that 
to state it is to prove its justice. It is that for the same kind of 
zvork there shall be paid to women teachers the same amount of 
compensation as is given to the men. When a similar bill passed 
the legislature last year, the governor of this state vetoed it upon 
the ground, as I understand it, that it applied only to the City of 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 379 

New York, and not to the other cities of the State. Our esteemed 
executive seems more desirous of maintaining and upholding the 
principle of equality of locality than the principle which animates 
the friends of this bill, to wit: equality of opportunity. He seems 
to he more bent on preserving an abstract principle of uniformity 
than in upholding a concrete proposition of justice. (Applause.) 
My friends, it seemed to me, that among the very first to come 
forward as the warm advocates of this bill would be the men 
teachers of New York. When Marie Antoinette was made the sub- 
ject of execration and ignominy in her own country, I should have 
thought ten thousand swords would have leaped from their scabbard 
to resent the insult to her Majesty. Is chivalry dead in New York? 
(Applause.) Have our men become so blind — blinded by the love of 
gain — that the ancient spirit which would fight for a ribbon and die 
for a smile, has become completely obliterated? (Applause.) 

But women teachers of New York, the principle upon which this 
bill is to succeed is not one of chivalry or of manly generosity to- 
wards the female sex. To the everlasting credit of the so-called 
weaker sex be it recorded that whenever she has entered the list 
to compete with men, she has demonstrated her capacity of doing 
that work, as good as that done by the men themselves. (Ap- 
plause.) And the women teachers of New York, with the capacity 
of doing that work, to every one's satisfaction, ask for this con- 
sideration — not begging it as a boon — but demanding it as a plain 
and simple proposition of common honesty and common justice. 
(Applause.) And because there underlies this hill a plain and 
simple proposition of justice, and because it -finds an echo in the 
heart of every American citizen, who after all is a lover of fair 
play, I think I am safe in predicting for the fate of the bill this 
year an overwhelming success, and that it will at last find its 
place upon the statute hooks of the State of New York. (Ap- 
plause.) 

Horace E. Deming, Attorney, at Cooper Union, Jan. 30, 1908 

In listening to Miss Strachan, I could not help thinking that after 
all the first purpose and the main purpose of government, the 
reason we need government at all, is in order to have justice. If 
we could all do justice, all have justice, without any government, 
what a happy rule it would be. But you cannot have justice unless 
the government does justice. And that is why so often we appeal 
to government. It needs no argument to convince any sane and 
reasonable person — there is quite a difference, you know, between a 
reasonable and a reasoning person — it needs no argument to con- 
vince a sane and reasonable person that a man or a woman, a city 
or a state, a corporation or an individual, any employer that pays 
A a different price from B for doing precisely the same work, is 
doing a mean thing. (Applause.) Now, there is something in- 



38o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

effably mean in treating a woman worse than you treat a man. 
(Applause.) And so you get rid very simply and very easily of 
the complicated economic arguments that have been put into the 
public prints in connection with this Teachers' Bill. The treat- 
ment of the teachers in New York has been ineffably, unspeakably 
mean. If the men are paid too much, reduce them to the women's 
salary. If the women are paid too little, raise them to the men's 
salary. If neither salary is just, find a salary that is just, but for 
the same work pay the same price. (Applause.) 

But I wish to talk of something else. I do not know whether one 
felt more amused or more exasperated at the long, learned edi- 
torials — ignorant editorials, if the editor did not know — I presume 
he did not — to the effect that the great and sacred principle of 
home rule was violated when the teachers of New York appealed 
to the State Legislature. (Laughter.) And now, ladies and 
gentlemen, what is home rule? It is something we need very much 
in this city, and if we had it, don't you think the teachers would 
get their rights? I do. (Applause.) Home rule means a govern- 
ment of the city directly responsible to the people of the city over 
whom it exercises the power. We have not that in New York yet. 
I hope we may have it. Do you know what the Board of Educa- 
tion is? Do you suppose the Board of Education is responsible 
to the cityf Have you any idea, any of you here — editors or re- 
porters, men, women, visitors, anybody — have you any idea that the 
Board of Education in this city is responsible in any way whatso- 
ever to the people of this city or to any elected officers of this city? 
Do you think there is any earthly zvay by which the people of this 
town or any elected official of this town can hold the Board of 
Education responsible for its acts? Well, there is no such way; 
and they call that home rule. 

There are about four dozen men in the Board of Education, each 
one of whom is in for a five-year term, and he cannot be removed 
except on charges, and he has the right to be represented by 
counsel. Those of you who are over forty — perhaps there are some 
who will confess to that — will recall that when the heads of our 
city departments were appointed in that way, we never could re- 
move them, if we tried. The mayor could never get rid of them. 
The Board of Education is in that unrootable class. They are 
there, and they are there to stay, and the mayor has no more power, 
no more influence, no more right over them than you, or you, or 
you. They are entirely outside of his jurisdiction. All he does is 
to name them, and that ends it as far as he is concerned. He can- 
not veto their acts; he cannot influence their conduct, they are an 
utterly irresponsible outside authority, and you cannot hold them 
accountable for anything they do as members of the Board of 
Education, as long as they do not steal or do something of that 
kind ; and then it is a Criminal Court process, and not your affair 
or mine ; and that is home rule. And so, when the teachers applied 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 381 

to the Board of Education, and the Board of Education would not 
even acknowledge the receipt of the communication, and incidentally 
a good while afterwards in the corner of the minutes, it was found 
that the committee whom the communication had been referred to, 
asked to be excused from further consideration of the communica- 
tion — there was no remedy at home, absolutely none. Now, what 
are you going to do? Did you know that the Board of Edu- 
cation was not a city department? Did you know that the city 
cannot control it in any way? Did you know that the Board of 
Education makes its ozvn contracts, that the city does not make 
them? Did you know that the teachers, if they are not paid, have 
to sue the Board of Education, that they cannot sue the city? It is 
a wholly independent corporation, just as independent as the New 
York Central Railroad is, and that is pretty independent. It is 
not like the Dock Department; it is not like the Street Cleaning 
Department or the Bridge Commission. Once in a while the 
mayor removes one of them— did you ever hear of his removing 
a Commissioner of Education? 

Now, to be perfectly plain about it, the Board of Education is 
an independent corporation, organized under state law, subordinate 
to nobody on earth but the legislature, having in charge the state 
function of education, within the locality of New York City; and 
there is no power under the sun superior to the Board of Education 
within its functions of education, but the New York State Legis- 
lature; and there is absolutely no other power to which the school 
teachers could appeal (applause), and there is no other place 
now, either. 

We convinced our masters^ the legislature, that it was their 
proper function to grant this increase of pay to women teachers — 
that an injustice was being done — but the governor vetoed the bill 
He said it was a State Function. He said that injustice was being 
done, but he also said that the state could not undertake to do 
justice in one corner of it, and that everywhere in every State 
Department this principle of justice should prevail; and so he 
vetoed the bill. I trust that he will see that for once he did not 
see correctly. In its essence, his veto meant — you shall not have 
justice anywhere if you cannot have it everywhere. Now, there 
is a fallacy there; and I am disposed to believe that if we are so 
fortunate as to reconvince the legislature, that we will have an 
additional argument to present to the governor. Following what 
the legislature did last year, the Board of Education attempted to 
correct some of the injustice and they recommended to our Board 
of Estimate and Apportionment a budget that would have increased 
the salaries and other expenses of the Board of Education by 
some $2,000,000 or $3,000,000. What happened? Exactly what 
happened in 1900. They would not have it, and they never will 
have it, and they never have given a proper appropriation. They 
always have other use for their money than spending it for the 



382 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

education of our children. / think when the governor's attention 
is called to that, that we shall find an additional argument for the 
passage of our hill. 

Address by Harriet Stanton Blatch 

Teachers, as I have watched your great battle I have thought 
what a tremendous weight upon us tradition is. How it cramps 
us; holds us tight. What else, teachers, than that once upon a 
time clear back in the middle ages, women were paid less than 
men, and so you are going to be paid less to-day. But now I am 
going to give you a little optimistic message where there is no 
tradition in regard to women, and tell you that there are women 
who are not faced by this question of unequal pay for equal ivork. 
For instance, when young Dr. Crawford this last summer passed 
her examinations and at last won a place in one of our great city 
hospitals, and came to the hospital door, she was not told that she 
must take one-half of the pay of the man who had preceded her 
in that work. When Dr. Barringer, then Emily Dunning, was ap- 
pointed the ambulance surgeon at Gouverneur Hospital, she was 
not told that she must take only part of her pay. When my 
daughter, Nora Blatch, step by step passed her examinations, un- 
til she reached her goal as far as she, a girl of twenty-four, could 
go, and became an assistant engineer in the Board of Water Supply 
(applause), she was not told that she was to have only a fraction 
of the pay that she was worth to the city. Now, my dear teachers, 
I feel your mother just as I feel the mother of that girl, and the 
intimate loving friend of these other women that I have mentioned 
to you. I feel your mother, and through every inch of my body 
goes rebellion at the injustice done you women. (Applause.) I 
have not quite liked to mention these very personal and dear 
examples to me, but your great leader, Miss Strachan, told me I 
must; and when Miss Strachan commands, I obey; and you have 
to obey also. (Applause.) Now, just one more example I am 
going to give, and then I will have done. A few years ago one 
of the very high positions in a great city department was vacant. 
A woman held the next position below that high position. She 
did all the work of the high position for some years and a half 
or two years. At last they thought they would fill that upper 
position and they advertised the examination for men only. Three 
women in this city were at once alert. We went down to the 
offending person and began to argue that question with him as 
to making that examination for men only, and we argued and 
argued with him, and the argument got hotter and hotter, the 
beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead, as first one woman 
and then another, and then another, took her turn at him; and 
finally he put down as his trump card, " Ladies, do you realize the 
salary cannot be changed, and it is $3000 a year ? " " Yes," we 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 383 

said, ** we realize it, and if a woman can stand up under that 
examination she can stand up under the $3000 a year." (Laughter 
and applause.) The results? It was exactly like the first inter- 
national yacht race. You know we had to go to England the first 
time — we have never had to go again — and the race was around 
the Isle of Wight. Queen Victoria was interested in the race, and 
as the Yankee yacht came footing up to the finish, she asked a man 
who was standing there watching the race through a field glass, 
"Well, what boat is second?" "Your Majesty, there is no sec- 
ond." Our woman had no second; she was supreme. There was 
not a second nor a third to appoint from; they had to give it to 
her, and she got the $3000 a year. (Applause.) 

Women teachers, why should your profession he discriminated 
against in the zvhole range of the Civil Service examinations, in 
the placing in positions and the paying of salaries? If I were a 
tyrant — some people say I am — but I mean a great big tyrant able 
to do things, and if the gods came to me and held in their hands 
the world and said to me: "What will you take to rule?" with- 
out a moment's hesitation I would say : " The schools." For I 
would know that the future lay within the hollow of my hand. 
For weal or woe, you teachers are making the to-morrow in our 
nation. Oh, not to do you justice! Think of it — a great community 
discriminating and making their teachers feel discontented, dis- 
loyal! We must win your loyalty and content by doing you 
justice, (Applause.) 

Address by Rev. Edward McGuffey, Episcopal Cathedral, 
Newtown 

Mr. Chairman and Ladies: I presume the only reason why I 
have been invited down here to-night is that, as I look on the 
program, I am the only representative of any of the churches. 
And as the Church of God in all its branches has been most in- 
terested not only in women but in education, I am very glad indeed 
to come down here from the Borough of Queens and to add what 
my word and influence may do for the betterment of women in 
this regard. Although accustomed to preaching sermons and oc- 
casionally to engineering the taking up of collections (laughter), 
it is very seldom that I am called upon to face so many people; 
and so if I am troubled by any embarrassment, I trust that you will 
lay it to the circumstances of the case. But I would like to say 
as connected with my interest in education for seventeen years 
in the old town of Newtown, I have assiduously worked with those 
interested in education, and with some fair degree of success. I 
may say that the love of education runs in my veins, because I am 
the son of that old man McGufifey who wrote all the McGuffey 
books ; and if you will do me the honor to come to my rectory I 
will open my fire-proof safe and show the original contract for 



384 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the original McGufifey rhetorical guide for which my father re- 
ceived $500, payable quarterly during the year. But as my mind 
goes back to those old times, I feel as if I were borrowing my 
father's plumage; somewhat as Tom Hood felt when he went to 
Paris and went up in a balloon, and went up so high 
that when he looked down in the streets of Paris, it 
looked as if all his uncles were ants. (Laughter.) Mr. Chairman, 
and ladies and gentlemen, I have examined this matter of the equal 
pay of teachers with a great deal of care and I will not go over the 
grotmd which Miss Strachan and others have so fully covered; but 
I may say in one point I think Governor Hughes is right. I 
think what we propose that he shall do for the women teachers of 
New York City, it would be well for him to propose to do for the 
teachers of every city of this state. There can be no question about 
that. God, who gave women the duty of bearing children, knew 
into whose hands to place their education. The best teachers of 
the elementary schools, if not of the high schools in the world, are 
the women of to-day ; and if God had intended men to be such 
superlative teachers, He would have caused them to bear some of 
the women's burdens. I myself am a graduate of the public schools 
of Cincinnati. I remember some of those teachers there. In the 
early course, the best teachers we had were the women. The best 
teacher in the Woodward High School, was Miss Mcllvoy, whom 
I remember well — the best teacher of one of the best high schools 
west of the Alleghanies. My old teacher when I was in the fourth 
reader, Mrs. McGill, I think of now with great pleasure. She 
was a Scotch woman who had very bright red hair and a fiery 
temper; but she was the best, the kindest, the strongest teacher. 
I remember I had been sent out on numberless occasions to buy 
the rattan with which I was to receive my own punishment; and 
yet at the end of my year there, we boys got together and my 
father wrote a poem, which is still in my mind. 

There can be no question about the justice of your cause, and it 
will prevail in the end. Mr. Chairman, and ladies and gentlemen, 
what would you think if I should go up here to the horse market 
and buy a horse and be very much pleased, and agree to pay $200, 
and then discover the horse was a mare, and say, " I will only give 
you $150? " (Great laughter.) And if my horse was a mare, Mr. 
Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, I would not say, " Because you 
are a mare you should only have three quarts of oats, while the 
gelding in the next door gets four " (laughter.) If an author 
should come with a good book, through the mail, send it to one 
of our publishers, and the publisher should agree to pay a price, 
say $500 or $600 for it, and then find that the author was a woman, 
would he be justified in saying, " You shall have but $250 for the 
book?" If a woman should paint a portrait, is she to get but 
$250 for a portrait for which a man would get $400? Does a 
woman pay less taxes than a man, because she is a woman? If 



'EQUAL 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 385 

she owns a piece of property, are her assessments less than they 
would be if she were a man? There can be no question about the 
justice of your cause; and it will prevail. I am glad to come down 
here to let you know that the best elements of the Borough of 
Queens- are in this struggle with women for equal right, for equal 
pay. (Great applause.) 

Resolution offered by Rev. Henry A. Mottet and seconded by 
Ex-Judge William H. Wood, 

Rev. Mottet: — Ladies and Gentlemen: As an ex-public school 
teacher, and, thank God, as a public school boy, too, I esteem it a 
very great pleasure to ofifer you for your consideration hereafter 
the following resolution: 

Resolved, That the citizens of the City of New York here as- 
sembled in Cooper Union, January 30th, 1908, do endorse the 
" Equal Pay Bill " presented by the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers of the City of New York, and urge the legisla- 
ture to pass, and the Mayor of New York City, and the Governor 
of the State of New York to approve the same. 

The Chairman: The Hon. Judge W. H. Wood will second the 
resolution proposed. 

Judge Wood: Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: It was 
not until I arrived in the hall to-night that I learned for a cer- 
tainty that I should be called upon to address this large and splendid 
audience upon the question which had called it together, in any of 
its aspects. A few weeks ago a couple of ladies interested in the 
movement asked me if I would come here to speak in favor of the 
measure, and I told them I should very gladly do so, because I 
was a believer in equality. (Applause.) I have been preaching 
democracy all my life, and democracy, as I learned it, knows neither 
race, creed, sex nor color. (Applause.) It welcomes beneath its 
broad banners all human beings as equal in civic rights and 
privileges. And because I believe in these doctrines, Mr. Chair- 
man, ladies and gentlemen, it is with the greatest of pleasure that 
I second the resolution which has been offered before you for your 
action. 

It seems to me that it is utterly unnecessary for anyone to offer 
arguments here in favor of the doctrine of equal rights for all 
human beings. The logic of the adversaries of this measure to me 
resembles the Peace of God in that it passeth all understanding. 
(Laughter.) The only objection apparently which is really made 
to the measure is that it in some way violates the doctrine of home 
rule. That point has been answered in various ways by the gentle- 
men who have addressed you, very logically and very completely, 
and yet it seems to me that they have all omitted the underlying 
principle upon which our public schools are founded. The public 
schools of this State are not local institutions anywhere. The 



386 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Public School system of our state is embodied in its constitution 
as a state policy and there is not a single rural school district any- 
where from Lake Erie to Montauk Point that has the right to 
build a schoolhouse except by permission of the authority of the 
State of New York; and, therefore, when people tell you that 
regulating salaries of public schools in any portion of the state is 
a violation of the doctrine of home rule, you have but to point to 
the constitution of the state and to the decisions of the Court of 
Appeals to furnish them with a complete and satisfactory answer. 

I am very much impressed with the speech of the gentleman 
who preceded me, who so eloquently described this Republic 
founded upon the consent of the governed. It is needless for me 
to say that I am thoroughly in accord with the spirit of Miss 
Strachan when she says that no matter whether this contest wins 
this year or not, the teachers are in it to win. (Applause.) 

Resolutions passed unanimously. 

SPEECHES AT MASS MEETING— ASSOCIATION HALL, 

Brooklyn, March 6, 1908. 

Presiding, Hon. William J. Gaynor, Justice, Appellate Division, 
Supreme Court. 

Address by the Hon. William J. Gaynor* 

Presiding at Mass Meeting held by Interborough Association of 

Women Teachers, in Association Hall, Brooklyn, 

New York, March 6th, 1908. 

Ladies and Gentlemen: I feel very much honored at being called 
here to preside over this meeting. I feel, however, as a presiding 
officer ought to feel, that it is my place to say very little. I feel, 
in fact, as Lord Eldon did, when Home Tooke, on trial before him, 
not liking the interference of his Lordship in the trial, told His 
Honor that his business was to help the tipstaffs keep order in the 
court room, while the jury tried the case. 

I suppose that I am not very well informed on the subject of the 
salaries paid to teachers of this city. There are others here who 
are well informed, and are able to speak on that question. I do 
know from my boyhood up that teachers in this country have been 
very miserably paid. I was brought up in the country and went to 
what we called in the country the " Deestrict School." I remem- 
ber the poor teachers — sometimes a girl and sometimes a young 
fellow — who taught the school, and for pay boarded around among 
the poor people of the community in which I was brought up, and 
in addition to their boarding around they received a very pitiful 
compensation. In fact, if they received no more year by year, for 

* Hon. William J. Gaynor was then Justice Appellate Division, Supreme 
Court. He is now Mayor of the City of New York. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 387 

all their lives, their heirs would not have any great squabble after 
their death over what was left. That has been the case all my life 
among the teachers in our common schools — meaning common to 
all, and open to all. 

The teachers have been very poorly paid in this country, and 
that holds good all the way up and down through all scales of 
teachers and professors. Those in our colleges are paid poorly. 
I do not know that there is a head master in this country who is 
receiving $10,000 a year. There are head masters in England re- 
ceiving much more than $ro,ooo a year. As a general proposition, 
I think it may be said that the payment of teachers in this country 
is lower than that of any of our other public servants, and I think the 
country comes to no good by being too niggardly in regard to the 
compensation of its public servants. They should be paid at least 
fairly well. 

I am told that you girl teachers have to begin with $600 a year. 
That is little enough, it is less than a policeman has to begin with, 
and the men in my court, to keep order, begin with double that, 
and I am sure they do a great deal less than you do; in fact, I 
have a strong suspicion that I could keep order without them 
(laughter), not that I want to cast any reflection on them. They 
sometimes make more noise than the whole courtroom (laughter). 
$600 is not a large sum in these times when it costs so much to 
live. 

Now, as I understand, the object of this meeting is to assert the 
proposition that girls and women are entitled for the same work, 
to the same compensation as the men. Now, I suppose that all 
the men in the public schools are of the same opinion (laughter), 
and if they are in your favor I think somebody has been playing 
a practical joke on me. Yesterday, at the breakfast table, an 
envelope was handed to me, containing 24 reasons why the salaries 
of the girls and women who are teachers should not be increased. 
If it is true that they are against you it seems to me very singular 
that your male comrades in the schools should not be with you in 
this movement. Certainly, it cannot hurt them if justice be done 
you. 

Now, of course, to a large extent, it is an economic proposition. 
It is a proposition involving a question of justice and a question 
also of economy. On its face, it would appear that if a woman 
does the same work as a man, and does it as well as a man does 
it, that she should get the same compensation. In fact, it is recog- 
nized all over this country that women are doing more efficient 
work in our common schools than the work being done by men. 
(Applause). At all events, it would appear that if they are doing 
the work, at least, as well as the men, they should be paid an equal 
compensation, unless there be a good reason to the contrary, if 
that be possible. 

Now th^ other side of the proposition is that it is said that it 



388 EQUAL 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

costs you ladies so much less to dress yourselves, and to live 
(laughter) that you ought to get less than the men get. I hope 
that is so, as I am bringing up several daughters myself (laughter). 
If that is so, and it takes so much less for a lady to live than it 
does a man, then it may be that as much should not be paid to you 
as is paid to a man. But, is that so? They say the men are all 
married and have big families to support. Is that so? I under- 
stand there are a lot of bachelors in the public schools vfho might 
well be married. 

Mr. Byrne, the clerk of my court, told me this afternoon that 
from his knowledge and experience in life, he could saj% that as 
to women — that it is a known fact that the girl who goes out into 
life in the schools as a teacher or as a stenographer, or into any 
work, sticks by the rest of the family and by the old folks at home, 
and that the women in this great city that go out to work have as 
many, if not more, people dependent on them for support as the 
men in the same occupation have. (Applause.) Now, I have not 
the statistics to verify that, and I have known all my life that it 
does no good, in a moment of enthusiasm or rush of blood to the 
head, to make exaggerated statements. It is better to have the 
statistics; and the matter for consideration is whether the salaries 
paid to the lady teachers of this city are too low from the begin- 
ning to the end, and whether they are fair in comparison with the 
salaries paid to the men for the same service, and you are all in 
the service of the State. The State would have nothing to do 
with education any more than keeping grocery stores except that 
the State derives benefit from education. The State maintains a 
system of free schools for that reason, to educate people suffi- 
ciently to keep government from tumbling down. Our free govern- 
ment rests on the intelligence of the many — on universal intelligence. 
In this country, where you have manhood suffrage, you will come 
out pretty poorly in the end, unless you have a fairly well educated 
moral man behind every vote, or the great majority of votes. 
Intelligent men are what count. The majority of the men who 
vote should be able to vote properly. If it were not for that inter- 
est which the States have in the matter, the government would 
leave education to the different religious denominations, and to 
private management, just as many other things are left in that way. 

I will not dwell upon it further, but introduce those who are to 
speak to you. 



Address Made by the Hon. William A. Pjrendergast * 

Ladies and Gentlemen : The few of us men who are left, and 
it is quite surprising that there are so many of us left after the 

* Hon. Williatn A. Prendergast was then Register, County of Kings. He 
is now Comptroller, City of New York, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 389 

severe trouncing that mere man has had to-night (laughter) I will 
not keep this up. If I moved uneasily on my seat it was because 
I wanted to jump up in defense of my luckless brothers who are 
about this building. While I am not going to dissent from any 
of the decisions, I am going on record to the extent of saying that 
I would like to hear this question or many of these questions re- 
garding my sex discussed in a meeting like this, where only my 
sex was represented (laughter). I think that if such a meeting 
could be arranged, you would have before you a very forcible 
demonstration of moral influence. 

I have been asked to-night to say a few words on the subject of 
civil service and equal pay. My friend, Colonel Bacon, made some 
reference to the superior moral suasion of women, and to coming 
into office or going to jail. Now I never had anything but a woman 
teacher, and I have at last gotten into office (laughter). I men- 
tion this in order to assure you ladies that tutelage under you is 
no disqualification or barrier to reaching the high esteem of the 
people (applause). It would have been a remarkable thing if 
your campaign had resulted in a complete victory. The truth is 
that there exists throughout this community an honest belief on 
the part of many men — influential men — that there are good, strong, 
moral, economic reasons why there should be a difference between 
the wages paid to women and the wages paid to men; and your 
victory will not be fully achieved until you have succeeded in con- 
vincing that element of the error of its reasoning. 

Years ago the requirements of the man as the source of earning 
capacity exceeded those of the woman. The necessity of acquiring, 
of earning, really devolved upon him; but because that was true 
many years ago is no reason whatever why it should be regarded 
as economical at this time, but because it is economically false, and 
I believe Judge Gaynor was absolutely correct when he said that 
this question was an economic one. The great difficulty is in in- 
ducing men to acknowledge that times have changed since several 
hundred years ago. Woman has come to be a very considerable 
element in the earning capacity of the nation, because economic 
changes and economic requirements have compelled her to take 
that position. This being the case, it is idle to attempt to array 
against an argument like this, economics of a hundred years ago. 

A few weeks ago, the women teachers were warned that they 
were proceeding on a dangerous course. It was claimed that just 
as soon as they forced any condition where the wages that would 
be paid them were much higher than those that had been originally 
paid, the men would immediately look to secure these positions 
themselves, and in the competition they would win. This argu- 
ment was fallacious. In the first place in the business world, nO' 
matter what moral argument you may try to introduce, the law of 
supply and demand regulates the question of wages, and the only 
reason why larger wages are paid to men than to women is that 



390 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

there are more available women than men. But in this case we are 
not dealing in a field where the law of supply and demand applies. 
We are dealing with a question that is a civil service question. I 
believe, and I am sure, that everybod)'' entertains this belief, that 
where the law can evoke its authority there should be absolutely 
no discrimination whatever between men and women in any position 
where women can give the same service as men; and if they can- 
not, they should not be permitted to occupy the position at all. 

During the last couple of months I have had occasion to become 
a little familiar with the Civil Service; and I have observed that 
the person who seems most familiar with that law is not the coun- 
sel of that department, but the Civil Service employee. 

We have certain laws passed in pursuance to the constitution 
of this state regulating the wages or salaries in Civil Service posi- 
tions. In the department where I am,* we have women employees. 
They are paid exactly the same wages as are paid to the men. It 
is the same throughout the entire state, although I notice in one of 
to-night's papers that someone contends that in many parts of the 
state women are not paid the same salaries as men under the Civil 
Service law. If this condition really prevails, it only prevails be- 
cause there has been a successful effort to get around the Civil 
Service law and disqualify women from occupying certain places. 

I took occasion this afternoon to look over a Civil Service ex- 
amination list, in which the competitors were called upon to dis- 
play their efficiency in six studies. There were on that list, as a 
result of the examination, 53 names of people who had received 85% 
and over. Thirty-six of them were women's names (applause) and 
a woman led the list. So much for the argument that women do not 
rise to the occasion of competitive examination when they have 
men as their competitors. The fact lives; a generality dies almost 
at its birth. There has been discrimination against women even 
under the Civil Service law, but it has always been caused by men 
in office, preferring to do what they thought was the popular thing 
rather than the essentially right thing. For instance, in a cam- 
paign in this county last fall, a candidate for office in which women 
had been employed stated publicly as an argument with which he, 
no doubt, hoped to propitiate the men voters, that if he was elected 
he would appoint no women in his office. He was not elected. 
(Applause). 

In other parts of the state, women have been disqualified, not 
because the law intended they should be, but solely because some 
individual exercised his personal influence, and in that way violated 
their rights. Now, this whole question resolves itself into two 
parts: one is the question of law, upon which I do not attempt to 
pass, because I am a layman; the other is the issue of elementary 
justice. That is a fundamental question. 

I know a large number of men who teach in public schools. I 

* Mr. Prendergast was then Register of the County of Kings. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 391 

have talked this question over with them, and / think that their 
position in regard to this bill rests mainly upon the fact that they 
have a fear that the authorities, if required to spend quite so much 
money on the schools, might make an eifort to cut dozvn the salaries 
of all in an effort to economise; and while they give twenty-four 
reasons why this bill should not be passed, I think with that fear 
removed, there would be comparatively little opposition by the men. 

This is a question of justice, and justice rises above all other 
considerations. Teachers come and teachers go, but justice is for- 
ever. 

I said to a man teacher of my acquaintance the other day, " I 
think they will win," and I have some glad tidings to make known 
to you. He said : " I think they will myself." 



Rabbi Stephen S. Wise^ at Association Hall, 
Brooklyn, March 6, 1908 

In the matter of the Davis schedule, which the White bill aims 
to repeal, I take my stand with Superintendent Maxwell, who de- 
clares it to be " unjust to the women in many respects," with Mayor 
McClellan, who admits that there " is much force in the conten- 
tion that the present law is unjust," and with Governor Hughes, 
who declares that " glaring inequalities now exist." To all of this 
I say amen, — and something more. 

As one listens to the objections which are urged against the re- 
peal of the Davis law and the introduction of the White schedule, 
one would imagine that it had been proposed to repeal the Ten 
Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount, and substitute some 
base maxim in the place thereof. What is it that we would do? 
Merely repeal a law which is unjust, unrighteous and arbitrary, 
which provides unequal pay for unequal work, and substitute there- 
for a fundamentally just and righteous measure, Equal Pay for 
Equal Work. The burden of proof, needless to say, rests upon 
those who favor inequality. The just demand of the women teach- 
ers of New York, Equal Pay for Equal Work, is radical only in the 
sense of being radically right. It lacks the one merit of being new, 
for as early as 1871, Wendell Phillips offered a resolution at a 
meeting at Worcester : " We demand that, whenever women are 
employed at public expense to do the same kind and amount of 
work as men perform, they shall receive the same wages." 

One of the grounds of the Mayoral veto last year was the puta- 
tive violation of home rule. Governor Hughes, on the other hand, 
maintains the very reverse, and vetoes the bill, alleging that the 
matter involved is not a question of purely local concern, but one 
of general principles and, therefore, generally to be established, if at 
all. For one thing, mandatory legislation touching educational 
affairs in the city of New York cannot truly be called violative 



392 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

of home rule, seeing that the Board of Education exercises a State 
function and operates as an agent of the State, so that the State 
by its Legislature is at home throughout the State in matters edu- 
cational. Again, the principle which is embodied in the White bill 
is really established and recognized in many departments of the 
State. If it were not, I can think of no better way to bring about 
its establishment than through the enactment of such a measure as 
yours, which seeks to establish the principle in the largest city of 
the State, containing nearly half of the entire population of the 
State. In this connection, as one who has lived outside of New 
York, I would point out the moral value to the nation of our great 
city taking the lead vigorously and resolutely in such high causes 
as that for which you are battling. It is not enough that Greater 
New York leads the nation in its weekly Clearing House state- 
ments ; we would have " Greatest " New York lead the nation in 
causes which make for national weal and national righteousness. 

If the White bill were, and it is not, in violation of home rule, 
technically speaking, then I say we must choose between home rule 
and the golden rule. Violate, if you must, the political policy of 
home rule, but touch not the moral principle of the golden rule. 

The gravamen of many honest objections to the White bill is 
that it would necessitate an enormous increase of expenditure which 
New York is unable to meet. I find it disingenuous to oppose the 
bill because of the present financial stress, seeing that the same 
objection was urged, and no less vociferously and persistently, 
before the advent of the present financial stringency. One is 
tempted to believe that the antagonism is due not so much to hard 
times as to hard heads. 

If it be necessary to practice economy, then, in the name of com- 
mon honesty, why should the citizens of New York suffer the 
wastefulness and profligacy which attend the mismanagement of 
the city's affairs and cry a halt not to extravagance, but only when 
an outlay is proposed which is dictated by elementary principles 
of justice and fair play? Who will venture to say that economy 
in the matter of pay to women teachers of New York would be 
proposed if women were voters? Unequal pay for equal work is 
the foundation of the Davis schedule, represents an injustice which, 
it is imagined, can be perpetrated upon non-voters with political 
impunity. 

New York cannot afford this " enormous increase of expenditure," 
— is dinned into our ears. Poor little New York with its annual 
budget of nearly one hundred and fifty millions! One thing New 
York cannot afford to do is the wrong. One thing New York can- 
not afford to be is unjust. New York can afford to do the right. 
" The right thing is always in the long run the best thing." 

Two further objections to the White bill, which were voiced by 
the Mayor, are : first, that it is mandatory legislation ; next, that 
it endangers the elasticity of the school system. The right ought 



EQUAL 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 393 

ever to be mandatory. The Davis schedule is no less mandatory. 
How long is the Board of Education to be suffered to do the wrong 
before we are to agree that the right should be made mandatory 
upon it? As for the so-called elasticity of the educational system 
of New York, I have heard of elastic currency and of elastic polit- 
ical consciences, but why should an educational system, of all 
things, be elastic? It is more important that it be right, that it 
be just, that it be moral. The present salary schedule is undeniably 
elastic, seeing that it is stretched into giving twice the wage to 
men that it awards to women for the same work. 

Upon one ground alone might it be admitted to be just that men 
and women should receive a differing wage, namely, if men and 
women perform different work and if, moreover, the work of one is 
more important than the work of the other. But not even the most 
rabid glorifier of man makes that claim. We are solemnly told that 
boys need men teachers at a certain age. We ask in turn, do not 
boys and girls need women teachers before arriving at a certain age 
as truly as boys need men teachers at a certain age? The distin- 
guished Superintendent of the City schools has stated : " Women 
teachers teach younger pupils, boys as well as girls, better than 
men." So that the summary of the matter is that men and women 
teachers may be said to perform work different in kind but not in 
quality, 

It cannot be said too often that no one would lessen the number 
of men teachers in the schools or lower their salaries. The White 
bill aims solely to raise women teachers' salaries to the end that 
the principle, equal pay for equal work, may be realized. Such 
men as will not wish to teach in the schools if women are to re- 
ceive the same salaries, the schools of New York can very well 
afford to do without. Our children will be the gainers by their 
retirement. It is urged with apparent seriousness that " the serv- 
ices of women teachers may be obtained more cheaply than those 
of men," that it is " not necessary to pay the same salaries in order 
to obtain a sufficient supply of women teachers." First, the injus- 
tice is perpetrated and then its results are pointed out as excuse 
for the continuance of the reign of injustice. What if the women 
teachers of New York coulfl, because of their needs, be compelled 
to accept one-half of the present salary which is allowed them? 
Shall that course, too, be adopted? That is exactly what we have 
done under the operation of the Davis schedule. It is that which 
we are resolved shall no longer be possible in our city. 

Your struggle is farther-reaching than you know. It is against 
legislation which rests upon the shifting sands of inequity and in- 
equality that you stand. The battle of the American Democracy 
must ever be against the injustice of caste and the menace of priv- 
ilege. The Davis Law represents the old and perishing order: the 
proposed White Law represents the new and abiding order. 

The contest in which you are engaged is but a skirmish in the 



394 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

war in which the supreme victories are yet to be won, — a war 
that will not be ended until justice shall have been done to woman. 
"Justice, Justice shalt thou pursue" — justice to man, justice to 
woman. 

Address by the Hon. Robert H. Elder 

Ladies and Gentlemen: I suppose Judge Gaynor's suggestion 
that the Mayor's veto in question was last year's veto, was intended 
to convey the implication, that therefore it was hardly worth dis- 
cussion. Well, I have read the message and I heartily concur with 
him, — it is hardly worth discussing. / did not find in it a single 
reason that would induce me to think for a minute that the women 
teachers of this city are not entitled to as much pay as the men. 
On the other hand, I could not help being impressed with the fact 
that the arguments put forth as reasons were merely subterfuges 
to hide the real reasons why justice is not awarded to the women 
teachers of this city. 

He had something to say in this message, for example, about 
home rule. Why, the question of home rule has nothing to do 
with this issue whatever. He also said that the enormous expense 
would be something that taxpayers would be unable to bear. Well, 
I think there is no question here of enormous expense. When 
you come to think of that reason, you must remember that, with 
political safety, there is only about a certain amount of money 
that can be collected in this community, through taxes. The real 
question is "Who is going to get it?" (Laughter and applause). 

On this money question, I feel inclined to say something, prob- 
ably under pressure of exuberant youth (I am still a boy) and I 
don't know whether I should ; but I know of so much money being 
wasted in this community through government influences, simply 
on this question of " divide," I know that so much graft went out 
with the opening of Livingstone Street — money expended need- 
lessly — spent in converting that alley into a wide street; I know 
of so much money that is wasted every year through the Real 
Estate Department of the Comptroller's Office; I know of so much 
money that is wasted ever year in the building of sewers and other 
improvements, — that I cannot believe but that the Mayor knows it, 
and others know it; and that when they talk about keeping this 
money from the women teachers (when they know you deserve 
it) that the whole question is simply who shall get it? (Applause). 
I believe this, too, that if you women had the right to vote you 
would get it. (Applause). If you had that political value, you 
would find out that the Mayor would be the first one to veto his 
veto; and after all, this question here of equal pay is really a polit- 
ical question. 

I know that His Honor, Judge Gaynor, has said that it is an 
economic question. The only economic principle that could be 
applicable to a case of this kind, is the economic principle that 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 395 

things of equal value should bring the same price ; and that the 
service and value of the work of women teachers in our public 
schools is the same as that of men teachers, no sane person can 
deny. (Applause). In certain departments of the school, there is 
work that only women can do : the kindergarten, for instance. 
It is not that women teachers' work is not as good as the men's, 
but because you are not worth as much to the politicians, that you 
are here. So this is not an economic question, but a political ques- 
tion. 

Well, I said that " home rule " had nothing to do with it. 
Now, let us see if that statement will bear the examination and 
analysis which Judge Gaynor said was a good thing. We do not 
get enough of home rule, that is, in the City of New York, as a 
political community. The locality, of course, should be permitted 
to say what teachers shall be paid, but the issue here is not a 
question of what teachers should be paid. The question is whether 
women shall be discriminated against in favor of men. Do you 
mean to tell me that any small body of men, — like the Board of 
Education, any single community like the city of New York, — 
should be given the exclusive power to say whether it shall do 
right or wrong in a great fundamental question like this? Should 
it not rather be written down in the Bill of Rights, with the pro- 
vision for due process of law, and with those provisions that pro- 
tect and safeguard the individual liberties of men, and those pro- 
visions that are intended to establish equality before the law in 
favor of all human beings — there should it be written that equal 
services shall beget equal pay. Unfortunately, this principle is not 
there. But do you not agree that this question really is for the 
bill of rights and not for a small legislative body? Instead of 
being referred to the Mayor or to the Board of Aldermen, it should 
be written down in the fundamental law, in the Constitution itself, 
that women should not be discriminated against. So I do not 
think it is a question of home rule. It is just like many of those 
questions concerning women that came up years ago, and which, 
with the advance of civilization, were cast aside as unworthy the 
thought of Christian people. 

Once, you know, woman was not allowed to draw any salary at 
all. If she went out and earned a wage the husband drew it. 
(Laughter). Those were pleasant days for the men (laughter) 
and they would have opposed the passage of any bill to give her 
the right to draw her own wages. It was a long time before the 
law allowed woman to own property and control it, and only within 
recent years in the State of New York has woman been given the 
right to control her own property. This question to-night is right 
in the line of evolution and it must be solved, — probably not now, — 
possibly not through this bill, but it will come sooner or later — 
that you will get the same pay as the men for the same work. 

Now, I received one of those circulars that Judge Gaynor spoke 



396 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

about, giving 24 reasons evolved by the men against this measure. 
I did not believe that any man, born of woman, could oppose this 
bill; and what made it worse to me was the fact, as I afterwards 
learned, that although the men are attacking the women on this bill, 
the women have made no attack on the men at all. (Applause). 
The women have not asked that the men's wages be reduced, and 
have not asked that no increase be given to them. Indeed, they 
have been generous enough and careful enough to put a clause in 
the bill providing that the pay now given to the men should not 
be reduced. Yet the men are flooding the city with these circulars 
against this bill. It is impossible to describe to you the feeling 
that came over me, when I read that circular. I just got the sen- 
sation of seeing a big strong man striking at a woman, and I felt 
that I would like to do just what any real man would feel like doing 
under such circumstances (laughter), and I did come pretty near 
demolishing the circular. This action on the part of the male 
teachers is, to me, one argument in favor of the bill. 

I certainly thank you, my friends, for this opportunity of ap- 
pearing before you and speaking in behalf of so just a measure. 
It is the first time in my life that I have ever spoken authorita- 
tively to school marms. (Laughter). As a rule they have spoken 
with authority to me (laughter), and when they did I learned to 
sit up and listen. Let us hope that this bill will become law, and 
also that in time to come, other benefits and immunities under the 
constitution, that should come to woman, will be freely accorded and 
actively enjoyed. 

Address by the Hon. Alexander S. Bacon 

A very respectable sprinkling of mere men. 

You are very brave, and if you are brave, what do you think 
of me? My title is secure, and yet I must begin by stating to you: 
" Equal Pay for Equal Work." It is not true. It is " Equal Pay 
for Better Work." Woman is peculiarly fitted for the training 
of the young. Man is not. There must be a moral element in 
training to make a good citizen. A man may be very learned and very 
wicked, and vmless he has instilled in him very early in life a re- 
spect for woman he will be a bad citizen. 

Miss Strachan says you voted 99.4 for principle. Men would 
not have done it. They would have taken the money every time 
(laughter). Therefore, women are like ivory soap — 99.4 pure 
(laughter), and if the men had been voting it would have been 
99.5 for the increase and let the principle go. I am shocked to 
hear from Mr. Elder that there is politics in this matter. I never 
knew that there was any politics ever suggested to the mind of 
the District Attorney, and he has even suggested that some of the 
revenues of this great city have been misapplied. (Laughter). 
In the opening of an alley into a street, he has even suggested 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 397 

that bosses have been privately enriched. Far be it from me for 
suggesting such a thing — the necessity of a new party where such 
bosses do not exist. (Laughter). 

This is a subject of abstract justice. No voter has a right in a 
repubHc to vote against his ideals, for in a republic, where the 
people rule the people, the people would be the victim and the 
repviblic would fall. The strong arm of a despot may control an 
entire nation of criminals ; but in a republic where the people rule, 
the people must live up to their ideals or the republic would fall. 
Therefore, the girls and the boys should be trained with respect 
for law and morality, and woman, therefore, is far better fitted to 
instill in the minds of the young the high ideals that form the 99.4 
of her life. (Applause). Our form of government does not per- 
mit religious instruction in the schools, but does permit moral 
instruction, and moral suasion by women is of the very highest 
quality. If there be a class of unruly boys who have to have the 
discipline of a man teacher, give to that position a higher salary 
that you may get a competent teacher; but if the man fails and 
Miss Strachan be placed in that place, and succeeds, she earns the 
same salary. 

We demand the highest qualities in our teachers. They must be 
graduates of the High School and the Training School. Any man 
with that training thinks himself competent to be President of a 
Bank at $25,000 per year (laughter) ; and the same moral qualities, 
intelligence and learning would receive a higher remuneration in 
any other department of the public service. You therefore ask 
nothing but strict justice. 

I do not see how the man is as well fitted, or why he should 
be vised at all in our public schools. Their muscles are of no 
value. I occasionally got the benefit of that side of instruction 
and behold what a model citizen it made out of me. (Laughter.) 
Inasmuch as the male teacher is not permitted to wield the rod, 
since all discipline must be by moral suasion, who so competent 
to use it as the women present? The moral qualities of the teacher 
are more important. The great masses of our boys and girls never 
get beyond our grammar departments. During that formative 
period their morals must be given a good start, or they will land 
in the penitentiary or in office. (Laughter). Therefore it is 
necessary that they should have surrounding them during their 
tender years the beneficent influence of women, and it is the moral 
influence of the common people upon which the republic must 
depend. 

We would have had no republic after a century of trial had it 
not been for the public school and the good influences of old New 
England. You have a great mission to perform, and it is only 
common justice that you should have wages that are equal to the 
demands that are necessary for that position. Let there be no 
wi'ong distinction. 



398 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



Address by Carrie Chapman Catt 

I regret indeed that this Male Teachers' Association did not send 
me one of its documents. Perhaps I might have found something 
more important to say to you to-night. 

Of one thing I am sure, although they may have found 24 ex- 
cuses, they have not found 24 reasons. 

Our public school system exists in this country solely as the 
protector of the greatness of this American republic. In these 
days, we Americans have mighty problems to solve, problems which 
have no precedents, and yet when those problems arise for dis- 
cussion the invariable decision is that the solution is to be found 
in the public schools. We have a mighty problem of immigration, 
and this is also a problem which may be solved in the public schools. 
Leave the matter to our teachers and they will train the children 
so that in the coming generation they will be as loyal to the stars 
and stripes as children born on our own soil. Within a little time, 
four great men, whose names are known the wide world over, 
have written on the question as to why patriotism was upon a de- 
cline in this country. They all held that it was declining, and each 
one declared that there was but one solution for this question, 
and that was to teach patriotism in the public schools. 

We hear upon all sides of graft in connection with corporations 
and institutions. The solution of these difficulties lies with the 
public schools. We of this generation postpone the settlement of 
these problems, and lay the burden upon our army of public school 
teachers. If we are to put upon them this responsibility, why 
should they get less salaries in many cases than men whose only 
duty is that of manual labor? What shall we say when the ques- 
tion is raised as to whether women should be paid less than men? 
That the question should be raised is an outrage, 

I am a woman taxpayer, and I have glad news to give to you, 
and to-night is the first time I have been glad about it. The taxes 
have been raised and raised enormously, and for what possible 
purpose could they have been raised but that the powers that be 
know that this bill will pass the legislature, and pass if necessary 
over the mayor's and the Governor's veto, and so they have made 
ready to pay those salaries when the time comes. I intended to 
be mournful about my increased taxes, but now I see it clearly, be- 
cause I know the reason why and I congratulate you upon the 
success which is yours in advance. 

Address by George Frederick Elliott 

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: Most of you are cognizant 
of the fact that this is not my first appearance on a public plat- 
form to speak in behalf of woman's supremacy in educational mat- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 399 

ters and especially do I feel it an honor to speak before this splendid 
assemblage of ladies and gentlemen in behalf of the " Equal Pay " 
bill, in the interest of all the women teachers of the greater City, 
which, when passed, will eliminate, for all time, the distinction in 
salary between the sexes. 

I look upon this meeting as very auspicious — auspicious in that 
we have one of the most distinguished jurists of this country as 
our presiding officer — Mr. Justice William J. Gaynor; that we have 
met in a hall notable for great meetings in this borough, — meetings 
that have been held for the uplifting of our fellowmen; and that 
we have met here to make history. 

This "Equal pay for equal service" bill, in my judgment, is 
bound to become a law in this State, and this presence, from plat- 
form to audience, will enter largely into the influences which will 
eventually bring about its passage. 

The clear and comprehensive addresses you have listened to by 
the gentlemen who have preceded me have embodied almost every 
phase of thought and argument that could be presented on behalf 
of this " Equal Pay " bill, and I hardly know that I can say any- 
thing that would add to the strength of their argument. 

It has been suggested that I review some of the encouragements 
in the Governor's veto message, and, if possible, give some sound 
reasons for renewing the work for the re-passage of the bill. 
May I say, almost at the outset, that I am a great admirer of 
Governor Hughes, and I think the people of this State are singu- 
larly fortunate in having such an executive at the helm. No one 
doubts his purity or strength of character, his courage or his 
ability. They have all been demonstrated to the satisfaction of 
thinking men and women. In the reasons he has assigned for 
vetoing the " whitest bill that ever passed a Legislature," he had 
no words of censure of the women teachers or their methods, and 
I think that the press and the public fully appreciated this. He 
tells us, among other things, that " the glaring irregularities and 
gross inequalities that now exist in the present law clearly should 
not be permitted," and he disposes almost in a word of the ques- 
tion of " home rule," for he tells us that " the Board of Education 
is directly subject to the control of the Legislature, and whatever 
provisions may be found necessary or wise for the purpose of 
defining its powers or prescribing its policy must be prescribed by 
the Legislature, and no other authority is competent to make such 
provision." 

If the people will get clearly into their minds the fact that the 
Board of Education is an arm of the State government, deriving 
all its power from legislative enactment of the State, and is in no 
wise subject to the control or direction of the city authorities, they 
will better understand our contention here. 

The Davis law was enacted, as I have stated, to meet the needs 
and requirements of the City of New York, and we simply ask the 



400 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

Legislature to fix the salaries of men and women on the super- 
vising the teaching staff, and regulate said salaries by merit, the 
grade of class taught, length of service, and experience in teaching 
cr supervising, and that no discrimination or difference in the 
amount of salar}^ paid men and women shall be made on accomit 
of their difference in sex in the schools of Greater New York. 

It is not a question of salary or wage that we are agitating at all. 
It is purely the question of service. In plain Anglo-Saxon, the 
broad question is asked, " Is a woman, because she is a woman, to 
receive less pay for service which she actually renders than a man 
shall receive for the same service ? " For my part, I say, most 
emphatically, no, and a thousand reasons might be advanced to 
support my belief, but we can do no better than to take the language 
of His Excellency, the Governor of the State, and say that the 
present law presents " gross inequalities " which must be remedied 
by the Legislature of this State. 

I think it must be conceded that the Governor is in a very much 
better position to determine the equities of this bill after a fourteen 
months' incumbency of his office than when he was called to pass 
upon it before, when he had been but six months at the helm. He 
now has the added knowledge of the vast amount of labor that has 
been performed in spreading the matter, in all truth and fairness, 
before the citizens of this great city; in the number of meetings 
that have been held; the vast correspondence and the petitions 
that have been prepared and forwarded to him and to those inter- 
ested in the matter, and the large amount of literature that has 
been distributed among the taxpayers of our city; the number of 
addresses that have been made and published upon the subject, not 
only by members of both houses of the Legislature but by some 
of the most distinguished citizens of the State, both men and 
women. 

Governor Hughes is a learned and far-seeing man, and, as I have 
said, he has the courage of his convictions and dares to do right 
at all times, and I am sure that, with the added information before 
him with regard to the inapplicability of the principle for which 
we contend to the entire State, his knowledge of the law, and his 
oft-times admitted justice of our cause, he will have no hesitation 
in reversing his former decision, and when the Legislature again 
passes the " White bill," which it certainly will do, he will append 
his signature thereto, and thus become a part of this great his- 
torical movement which will forever redound to the honor and 
credit of our Empire State, of which he has proven himself to be 
so distinguished an Executive. 

I think that when the law is placed upon the statute books, it 
will seem to add a few inches to the height of every female in the 
State, and the members of the Legislature will be proud of having 
taken part in the legislation which has stricken from the statute 
books the words " male and female," for all time, as affecting serv- 
ants of public education, and that both saxes will hereafter stand 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 401 

or fall on their merits alone, and that position, and not sex, will, 
for all time, determine the value to be attached to it. 

Onr cr}' has been and ever will be " Equalization or nothing," 
and the " White Bill " will give us the consummation of our hopes. 
I know the women are willing, nay, anxious, to take their chances 
with such a law, and why should the men be afraid of their com- 
peting with them? Let the battle begin, and may the most cap- 
able competitors win, and I have no hesitation in saying that, both 
sexes being put to the test of their best ability, the standard of our 
pnbhc schools will be second to none in the world. 

I cannot close this somewhat rambling talk without propounding 
the query : " What woman, aye, or man, either, can read or hear 
mentioned the following names of distinguished women without 
feeling proud of what they have accomplished for the world's best 
good? 

Harriet Beecher Stowe, George Eliot, Elizabeth Barrett Brown- 
ing, Jane Austen, Clara Barton, Maria Mitchell, Julia Ward Howe, 
Florence Nightingale, Madame Curie, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth 
Cady Stanton, Mary A. Livermore, Lucy Stone, Pauline Wright 
Davis, Sarah Tyndale, Mathilda Joslyn Gage, Mary Wollstonecraft, 
Anna Dickinson, Ameha, Bloomer, Frances Wright, Lucretia Mott, 
Emma Willard, Laura Curtis Bullard, Lillie Devereaux Blake, Mrs. 
Lyons (Holyoke, Mass.), Nora Blatch, Grace C. Strachan, Dr. 
Elizabeth Blackwell (the first woman to receive the degree of 
M. D. in 1849 in Geneva, N. Y.), Dr. Barringer, Dr. Crawford, 
Harriet Martineaux, Emily Faithful, Hannah Longshore. &c., &c. 

A LETTER 

I count it a personal misfortune that I am too ill to go to 
your meeting to-night, for I should be proud and glad to testify 
in behalf of your cause of most obvious justice. Perhaps it is 
as well, however, for it is difficult to speak with restraint on such 
a subject. The idea that a certain piece of work deserves a 
smaller rate of compensation if it be done by a woman than it 
would deserve if done by a man is a monstrosity. That in this 
age it should find any excuse is inexplicable, and that an en- 
lightened community should tolerate it to the vast injury of some 
of our hardest-worked and worst-paid public servants, is enough 
to make us all ashamed and sorry. It is time we should cease 
to pick the lean purses of those to whom we commit the most im- 
portant of all our interests and it is time we should say to them 
that if we will pay teachers what their services are worth, we shall 
at least cease to take advantage of any teacher for the savage's 
reason that she is a woman. 

The other idea that this community cannot afford this act of 
justice is still less endurable. As a matter of fact it cannot afford 
to do anything else. On the cold basis of business economy there 
is nothing but waste and loss in fraud and injustice. The sug- 



402 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

gestion that this, the richest city in the world, cannot raise the 
comparatively small sum required is absurd. We have never 
seemed to find it difficult to raise money to buy rotten fire hose, 
nor to pay for the removing of snow that is never removed, nor 
to help the poor but deserving paving contractor. Then we can 
certainly raise it to pay these women something remotely approxi- 
mating a living wage. A just enforcement of the taxation laws 
upon corporations and other great interests would bring into 
the public funds a sum very much greater than that required here. 
The thirteen inillion dollars that the Metropolitan Street Railway 
Company owes at this moment and has long owed to this city for 
unpaid taxes would go some distance towards paying our de- 
frauded school teachers. A very small percentage of the amount 
wrung from us annually by the watered stocks and fictitious bonds 
of our public utility corporations would give us the money needed. 
If, therefore, we can afford as a community to supply the funds 
for the watered stock luxury, and if we can afford to let the 
corporations dodge their taxes, we can afford to pay public school 
teachers some fraction of what they earn. 

Of course there is no question that you will win. No cause of 
absolute and eternal justice was ever long defeated. But when you 
have won I should like to suggest one thought to you. You see 
how hard it is for disfranchised women to secure even a modicum 
of obvious justice. Here and there one body of women or another 
may secure a single concession like this, but do you really think 
that it is possible for women as a class to secure economic justice 
except by securing political justice? For do you really imagine 
that if the women teachers had been voters the politicians would 
dare to trample upon such a cause? 

With every hope for your speedy and complete triumph, 

Yours very truly, 

Charles Edward Russell. 
March 6, 1908. 

RESOLUTION 

Adopted at Mass Meeting Held by Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers at Association Hall, Brooklyn, Mar. 6, igo8. 

Whereas, Section 1091 of the Charter of the City of New York 
is the only statute in the laws of the State of New York that 
discriminates against women ; and 

Whereas, The Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bill seeks to amend 
Section 1091, commonly called the " Davis Law," so as to abolish 
the discrimination against the women teachers of the City of 
New York, 

Be it Resolved, That we, citizens of the City of New York, as- 
sembled here in Association Hall, 502 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 403 

Frida}', March 6, 1908, do unanimously endorse the Women Teach- 
ers' " Equal Pay " Bill, and urge the Legislature to pass, and the 
Mayor of the City of New York and the Governor of the State 
of New York to approve the same. 

Resolution offered by Rev. Lynn P. Armstrong, Rector, Cuyler 
Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn. 

Unanimously adopted. 



CARNEGIE MASS MEETING 
The American Editorial 

At our Carnegie Hall Mass Meeting, Dec. 17, 1910, Hon. Mira- 
faeau L. Towns said : 

" I assert here that there has not been a man born of woman 
who, by his intelligence or great activity of individuality and 
mentality created a new epoch in human affairs that was not 
indebted primarily and above all things to the influence and in- 
struction which he received from his mother or some other woman 
up to the time of his adolescence. 

" When we get away from the Garden of Eden and Eve, the 
first milestone is Moses. 

" And as we advance step by step, the occasions being too num- 
erous to mention here to-night, I will refer to a few modern in- 
stances such as the mother of Henry IV. and Jean d'Albret, not 
forgetting Alfred the Great of England, whose youthful step- 
mother, married at the age of 16 years to his old father, in- 
structed him in music and all of the sciences and knowledge 
which at that time were known and gave him the inspiration to 
start that country which at the present time rules over so many 
lands that the sun never goes down upon them. 

" And then comes the mother of Goethe, and the mother of 
Humboldt; especially of Humboldt, who started a new era in 
geology and natural history and who proclaimed hundreds of 
times that he owed all his knowledge to his mother's teachings. 
The great Napoleon received his first instructions in manliness, 
in virtue and honesty from his mother, and he never, in the mo- 
ments of his utmost greatness, forgot the debt that he owed to 
her and had her around him until he lost his scepter. 

" And if we come down to the history of our own beloved land, 
Washington and the memorable Lincoln, both men who made 
epochs in history, founding and cementing this country, got all 
that they knew up to the period of their early adolescence from 
the wisdom and teachings of their mothers. 

" This would seem to ordinary intelligence to refute the argu- 
ment that women are not qualified to teach boys. If other in- 
stances are necessary, we might cite Charles the Great, Charles 
XIL of Sweden, the great Gustav Adolph, Wesley, Pope Clement, 



404 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

all stars in the firmament of great attainments. But is it neces- 
sary? Right in our midst from day to day we see the little mothers 
in our schools instilling the idea of morality, obedience and man- 
hood into the minds of the conglomerate masses which receive 
the blessings of our educational system." 



HUDSON & MANHATTAN RAILROAD COMPANY. 

(HUDSON RIVER TUNNEL SYSTEM.) 

W. G. McADOO EXECUTIVE offices. 

President. 

HUDSON TERMINAL 

30 Church Street. 

New York, December 17, 1909. 
My dear Miss Strachan: — 

A severe cold prevents me, much to my regret, from participat- 
ing in your meeting to-night. 

You are contending, as I understand it, for the principles that 
for the same work, executed with equal efficiency, women should 
be paid as much as men. 

I don't see how there can be any difference of opinion on this 
point. The fact that a given service is performed by a person 
who wears breeches does not make that service less valuable if 
equally well performed by a person who doesn't wear breeches. 
It is the character and quality of the service itself that determines, 
or should determine, its value, no matter what the sex of the 
person who renders it. And it makes no difference, or should 
make no difference, whether the performer has or has not some- 
body to support; nor is it a question of the " em.otions," except 
in so far as the emotions inspire fair play and Justice. 

If a woman teaches the same classes in. the same grades as the 
man, and does it just as well, she should have the same pay as 
the man. 

If a woman sells tickets on a railroad just as well as a man, 
she should receive the same pay as the man. We voluntarily 
recogiiized this on the Hudson Tunnel System, where women 
are employed as ticket sellers. It was an act of common justice, — 
nothing more. It is unnecessary to multiply examples. The prin- 
ciple is sound beyond question. It is only a matter of its appli- 
cation. 

If this be admitted, how can we refuse to equalize the pay of 
men and women teachers? If women are discriminated against, 
why should it be continued? The only argument I have heard 
against it is that it will increase taxes. Even if this be true, can 
we continue to perpetuate injustice merely to keep taxes down? 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 405 

We can't afford to measure justice in dollars. It should be meted 
out at any cost. When the stricken people of Cuba cried out to 
us for justice, we didn't hesitate to make war on Spain because 
it might increase taxes. We didn't count the cost in blood and 
treasure when we decided that justice should be done. While 
we must be practical and reasonable in the application of every 
sound principle, we should not be deterred from correcting, within 
the limits of our means, inequalities or insufficiencies in the pay 
of men or women teachers because it may increase taxes. I do 
not know how far such inequalities or inadequacies exist, but they 
ought to be promptly ascertained and corrected. 

Modern economic conditions have forced women to work in 
the same fields as men. That, of itself, is hard enough. No good 
citizen should be willing to put woman at a disadvantage or to 
discriminate against her in the matter of pay or opportunity in 
the struggle for existence. 

With best wishes, I am. 

Very sincerely, 

W. G. McADOO. 

CITY OF NEW YORK 

Office of the Mayor 

Dec. 17, 1909. m 
Hon. Mirabeau L. Towns, Chairman, 

Mass Meeting, Interborough Associa- 
tion of Women Teachers, 
Carnegie Hall, City. 
Dear Sir: 

I regret exceedingly that a previous engagement deprives me 
of the pleasure of addressing the meeting of the Interborough As- 
sociation of Women Teachers this evening. 

I have long been in hearty accord with the movement to im- 
prove the condition of women teachers in the school system of 
the City of New York. It was with great regret that I found it 
my duty last May to veto the so-called Teachers' Equal Pay bill. 
It was in violation of the principle of home rule, and mandatory. 
I could obtain no satisfactory estimate of its probable cost, the 
figures submitted running all the way from four million to eight 
million dollars increase. I have, since then, received more care- 
fully prepared estimates that show that the increase to the annual 
budget would have been about thirteen million dollars. 

I did not feel that the financial condition of the City justified 
so large an increase at one time. In my veto message I promised 
to appoint a commission of representative citizens to ascertain what 
could be done in behalf of the women teachers of the City. This 
commission has not yet reported. 

It will be remembered that the Governor in vetoing one of the 



4o6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

equal-pay bills stated that in his opinion this State had not yet 
accepted the principle of equal pay for men and women,* and that 
one department of one city should not be singled out to test the 
new theory. 

In the development of the child a woman's care, supplementing 
the love and solicitude of the mother, has always been recognized 
as the ideal influence under which our future citizens should be 
trained in their youth. The acknowledgment of the fact that 
women teachers are the best, if not the only agents of the State, 
to educate the younger children, is nothing but a recognition and 
endorsement of our early training. 

For the teaching of little children there can be no question but 
that women are far superior to men, and that they are therefore 
entitled to a higher rate of compensation. 

I do not believe that the harsh rule of the commercial world — 
the law of supply and demand — should be applied to a condition 
so different from the average problems of daily life. 

The proposed plan to raise the salaries of women teachers of 
the lower grades by a certain annual increase to be determined 
by the local authorities and controlled by the Board of Estimate 
and Apportionment seems to have been carefully thought out and 
to be worthy of the most respectful consideration. It will do away 
with the greatest objection to all previous plans — that of at once 
increasing the annual budget by many millions of dollars. 

I believe that a gradual increase of the salaries of the women 
teachers, beginning with those receiving the lowest pay, is the 
best plan to suggest to the incoming administration, and I wish 
you all success in conquering this first step in the right direction. 

Respectfull}', 

GEO. B. McCLELLAN, 

Mayor. 



ABSTRACT OF SPEECH OF JUSTICE JOHN WOODWARD 
AS TOASTMASTER AT THE FIRST ANNUAL DIN- 
NER OF THE INTERBOROUGH ASSOCIATION OF 
WOMEN TEACHERS OF NEW YORK CITY, AT THE 
WALDORF-ASTORIA, SATURDAY EVENING, JUNE 22. 
1907. 

I am glad to preside at this, the first, annual dinner of the Inter- 
borough Association of Women Teachers of New York City. It 
is, I understand, the first public banquet ever given by an organiza- 
tion of professional women, and it may rightly be termed the 
beginning of a new social era. It is, therefore, no common occa- 
sion. It is, in fact, as distinctive, as important, as the annual 

* The Governor made no such statement. He implied this, but he was 
mistaken. G. C. S. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 407 

dinner by the New York Chamber of Commerce, for it is signifi- 
cant not only of the widening of woman's sphere but also indica- 
tive of her achievement. 

The times have changed and we have changed with them, and 
as we look around us and contemplate this distinguished gathering, 
he must be blind indeed who does not see evidence of the triumph 
of the New Idea and of the progress of civilization. It was not 
so long ago when such an event would have been accounted one of 
the seven wonders of the world. Less than a hundred years ago 
the legal status of woman was as insignificant as the condition 
of a serf during the Middle Ages. Not only did the law deny to 
woman the free disposal of her property and surround her person 
with a Chinese wall of prejudices and restrictions, but she was 
not even permitted to own her own children. What a married 
woman earned became the property of her husband. She could 
neither make a will nor enter into a contract. She had no rights, 
no privileges, save through courtesy. For ages woman had been 
excluded from the professions. Denied almost every opportunity 
to become her highest self, she merely existed. One by one, how- 
ever, these various disabilities, these rusty fetters of legal and 
economic injustice, forged by ingorance, have been cast away 
until to-day we see her exalted to that divine equality with man 
which was the evident purpose of evolution. The law of the sur- 
vival of the fittest has never been more successfully demonstrated. 
Though the Society of Friends had long before proclaimed their 
belief in spiritual equality, it was, I believe, Mary WoUstonecraft 
who, in the latter part of the eighteenth century, first began the 
agitation for the rights of women. Since then there have been 
many champions, many martyrs. To mention Elizabeth Cady 
Stanton and Anna Dickinson is to call up a hundred other names. 
With what success their labors and their lives of self-sacrifice 
have been crowned, this occasion is eloquent evidence. It is also 
a splendid tribute to the fact that such freedom as woman has 
achieved has been won against almost overwhelming opposition 
by woman herself. Gradually but surely she has widened her 
sphere and extended the boundaries of her influence until to-day 
she is man's rival and competitor in almost every calling. In 
1840 there were only seven occupations open to women. To-day 
she is distinguished in four hundred distinct lines of endeavor. 
No longer is she pitied because she labors, no longer does she eat 
the bitter bread of dependence. She not only holds her own, but 
she has gained, while advancing, the esteem and the admiration 
of man. She has added a dignity to labor; she has transfigured 
life; she has transformed our whole civilization. We have seen 
her enter the learned professions, Law, Medicine and Theology, 
and she has proved not unworthy. When in 1850 Dr. Hannah 
Longshore opened her office in Philadelphia, the doctors, much 
alarmed by this strange innovation, mocked at her attempt and 



4o8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

opposed her with petty persecutions. Even the druggists refused 
to fill her prescriptions. To-day over 10,000 viromen are practicing 
medicine in this country alone. 

Once, and that was not so long ago, either, woman was thought 
altogether incapable of high thinking. She can never, it was said 
with all the emphasis of masculine arrogance, compete with man in 
the severe mental discipline of the college. To-day more than 
20,000 young women are enrolled in our higher institutions of 
learning, and it is conceded, no longer grudgingly, that they have 
no cause to be ashamed. Of what woman has accomplished in 
authorship, of her efforts for social purity and the amelioration 
of suffering, of her discoveries in science, of her eloquence and of 
her contributions to freedom, it is not necessary for me to speak. 

To mention Elizabeth Barrett Browning, George Eliot, Flor- 
ence Nightingale, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Clara Barton, Emma 
Willard, Maria Mitchell and Madame Curie, is to say more than 
volumes! But it is in the field of education that woman has 
reaped her finest laurels. Of the public school teachers to whom 
the State confides the instruction of the rising generation more 
than half are women. And such women ! You have only to look 
around to admire. 

Here then is a force, an irresistible force which, as it can no 
longer be opposed, must be conciliated. Ladies, we capitulate, 
I bring you the white flag. After a century of unceasing agi- 
tation woman has at last lifted herself to her true sphere. She 
has discovered that in union there is strength, and this democ- 
racy of her mind, this confederation of her sympathies, this con- 
centration of her powers is, I am persuaded, about to become the 
greatest human force in our civilization. She has exalted her- 
self and has lifted man with her. She is the very heart of prog- 
ress. Surely it is not too much to say that she deserves her 
successes, and that wherever she labors she has proved worthy of 
her wage. And he must indeed be blind to truth and deaf to 
every tenderness who, gazing on this brilliant assemblage of fair 
women, could say that her intellectual triumphs have marred 
her beauty or lessened her charm. 

BANQUET 1909 

Congressman Sulzer: "If the Governor vetoes your bill then 
next year I'll nm for Governor, and it is certain that I won't 
veto it." 

Hon. Samuel B. Donnelly, Public Printer : " Equal Pay has ab- 
solutely nothing to do with supply and demand. It is not be- 
cause women demand the same salary as men do that so few are 
employed in the printing business, but because of the very great 
use of machinery, which in many cases demands the strength 
of a man. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 409 

" Woman is by nature a better ' mother ' to little children left 
in her care during the greater portion of the day than men are. 
Then why shouldn't she receive the same salary?" 

Lewis Nixon : " It is due to their (women teachers') efforts 
that the local schools have had such rapid development. Pupils 
taught by women have a much better understanding of human 
nature than have men, and are in that sense much better adapted 
for the business world." 

ADDRESSES DELIVERED AT FOURTH ANNUAL DINNER, 
INTERBOROUGH ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN TEACH- 
ERS, CITY OF NEW YORK, SATURDAY, APRIL i6th, 
1910, HELD AT WANAMAKER BANQUET HALL. 

Hon. William Sulzer: Miss Strachan, Ladies and Gentle- 
men : This is unexpected, but not embarrassing. I knew when 
I came here I would be asked to make a speech, and I was glad 
to observe I was down at the end, so that I would come last; but 
I see the teachers are close students of the good book, and be- 
lieve those who are last shall be first. 

It is a great pleasure for me to be with you again to-night. 
I came over from Washington especially to be here. (Applause.) 
And these are troublous times at the Capital. If the House is in 
session, and there should be a call of the House, a warrant for 
my arrest has been issued for being absent without leave; and 
the Speaker has the right to take away my pay. (Laughter.) 
But I am chancing all that with Uncle Joe. I am against him and 
I am with the teachers. (Applause.) 

I am here to-night to testify again to what I have frequently 
said during the twenty years I have been in public life — and that 
is, that I never could comprehend why any man who was a law- 
maker, should discriminate so far as justice is concerned, between 
man and woman. (Applause.) 

They call me a Democrat; and I am a Democrat, not so much 
in the political sense, as many people believe, but I am a Dem- 
ocrat in the generic sense. (Applause.) I believe in equal and 
exact justice to all. (Applause.) And that little word "all" in- 
cludes all sorts and all conditions of men and women (applause) 
here, there and everywhere. 

My sympathy is with the struggle the teachers of this city have 
been making for years for justice, for equal rights and for equal 
pay. (Applause.) I congratulate the teachers upon this magnifi- 
cent assemblage, and the success of this great banquet There 
are within the confines of the City of New York, many great 
organizations, but I undertake to say there is no other organiza- 
tion in the City of New York that could bring together so many 
distinguished, brilliant and representative people as the Teachers' 
Association. It speaks volumes for your cause. 



4IO EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I looked forward ever since the last banquet, a year ago, to this 
occasion, to be with you, to congratulate you that your struggle 
had been won; that your cause had triumphed; that your law 
had been put upon the statute book. But I regret to-night to learn 
that no further advance of the bill has been made during all the 
year. And someone is responsible for that. I hope that the 
brilliant minds of the men here, who wield the facile pen, — I know 
they do — will see to it that when the next j^ear rolls around, and 
another banquet is given, the law will be upon the statute books. 
(Applause.) That is the way you men of the press — that is the 
way you men of the magazines — and no one can pay the writers 
on the magazines a greater tribute than myself, because within 
three years they have worked in America the greatest revolution 
of modern times — I hope you will turn you thoughts and your at- 
tention to the struggle of these women ; and see to it that they 
get their rights, that they get justice. And for justice all mag- 
azines should be a temple, and for justice all the newspapers 
should be altars. 

Now, my friends, just a word more. I am a believer in the 
school ; and I am a believer in school-teachers, men and women. 
I believe that the mightiest force on earth is the little red school- 
house on the hill ; and next to that — the dominating influence of 
the school — the teacher in it. No one knows the debt the Re- 
public of America owes to the schools and to the teachers. 

God bless the teachers of New York and of America. (Ap- 
plause.) And may their efforts be crowned with success; and 
their struggle for equal rights, and for equal pay for equal work 
be won in the coming year. (Applause.) 

Commissioner Waldo: Miss Strachan, Ladies and Gen- 
tlemen : To education more than any other factor, America owes 
her great advance in civilization, in commerce and in industry. 
The training of the mind of Young America is a profession on 
which the future of the Union most depends. I congratulate you 
as teachers of the greatest and largest school system in the world. 
I believe that you should have equal pay for equal work. I am 
a strong believer in adequate compensation for public school 
teachers, who devote their lives to the education of our future 
citizens. On the school teacher devolves the task of instilling 
in the coming generations a love of patriotism, the traditions of 
our country, and a love of liberty. 

I am glad to be here to-night with you, and again I congratu- 
late you upon this magnificent dinner. (Applause.) 

Commissioner Arthur S. Somers: A year ago I had 
not taken any position, as far as the question was concerned, one 
way or the other. I had been thinking some, however, and en- 
deavoring to make up my mind as to what was the proper atti- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 411 

tude for one who was engaged in public work, and who might 
have to deal with this question sooner or later. I recall that 
during all this time, though many of the lady teachers believed 
that I was not their friend, inasmuch as I had failed to advocate 
their cause, that I found one of the most charming conditions that 
a man can possibly realize ; my friends among the women teach- 
ers, — and I had quite a number I am proud to say — when this 
question arose, never for a single instant wavered in their friend- 
ship for me, even though in their hearts they believed I was not 
friendly to " Equal Pay." There is a lady here to-night (Miss 
Ennis) who called at my house on school business, and as she 
was going, in some manner or other, we just touched on the 
question of equal pay; and she said to me: "The one thing that 
has pained me more than anything else is the fact that you who 
have been one of my oldest and best friends, is not on our side." 
And I simply smiled, — but her words set me thinking somewhat 
harder, and after having weighed the question, after having debated 
it, after having met all the arguments against it that I could raise 
within myself, I came to the conclusion that this question re- 
solved itself down to a matter of simple justice. And when I 
reached that conclusion, I felt it incumbent upon me, as one of 
your representatives, as a representative of the citizens of this 
city in the Board of Education, to ask the Board of Education 
to declare itself one way or the other on this vital issue ; and if 
possible to give color to the efforts of the women teachers — to 
show their sympathy for the efforts being made by these teachers 
in the name of justice; and to do this not for sentimental reasons, 
but simply because it is right. 

I voice these few personal remarks only that my position may 
be clearly understood; that all may know that when I introduced 
my resolution I did it with all the consciousness of the justice 
of the position that I felt I was impelled to take. I have absolutely 
no apology to offer to anybody for my act, and if I were the only 
man in the great city to stand up in favor of that resolution, I 
would be willing to count as that minority of one. 

My best wishes go with you. I sincerely trust that your ef- 
forts within a short time will be fruitful in successful results. 
The cause itself must win. There can't be any doubt about that. 
(Applause.) If we don't settle it; if this Board doesn't settle it, 
another administration will. If this legislature doesn't settle it, 
another legislature will. Because it is one of the things that is 
bound to move on; and if we don't get on the band-wagon and 
move with it, it will go on without us. But I assure you I 
give you my very best wishes, and I sincerely hope and trust that 
no effort will be spared to keep alive this vital issue, and to ed- 
ucate still further, as you have been doing in the few years you 
have been engaged in this work, the people of our great city and 
our great State. (Applause.) 



412 'EQUAL 'PAY 'FOR EQUAL WORK 

Mrs. Kate Upson Clark: I was a teacher myself, years 
ago ; so when I say " we " I count myself in with you. And we 
are to-night in the position of the Irishman, of whom you all have 
heard, who, when he drew his weekly envelope uttered an ejacula- 
tion of pain and grief. One of his friends nearby said : " What is 
the matter, Mike ; didn't you get as much as you were expectin' ? " 
And he said, " I am working for the stingiest man I ever worked 
for. Yes, I got as much as I was expectin', but I was countin' 
on gettin' more than I was expectin'." 

My friends, we were counting on getting more, and we didn't 
get it; but, as the speakers before me have said, you are bound 
to get it. 

I wonder if you ever considered how the position of the teacher 
to-day is different from what it was in the beginning. In the 
olden time, the middle ages, and since then, the position of the 
teacher was very low. You remember that almost all great 
teachers were then looked down upon. Look back to Quintilian, 
who was the first to oppose corporal punishment; and you re- 
member Socrates was put to death — and Quintilian was killed 
too because of his teaching, although he was a good man and a 
good teacher. And so on through all ages, the teachers have had 
hard work, and they have not been respected You doubtless 
remember that passage in one of Scott's novels, where it is said, 
"What do you want with reading and writing? Leave that to the 
women and the monks; it is no use to a man; all he wants to 
know is how to control a hawk, ride his horse and shoot with 
a bow." That was all the man prized in those days, and if he 
learned to read he was ridiculed for it; it was considered a silly 
thing for a man to do. 

But as time has gone on the position of teacher has become 
more honorable, and teachers have been paid more and more; 
the teachers have come to have a social position, and a business 
position, and from the present outlook, my friends, I believe in 
the course of time this trouble that we are having about equal 
pay will disappear. 

Of course there is no argument whatever against equal pay 
for equal work. (Applause.) It comes down simply to a question 
of expediency. Is it possible to do it? or isn't it possible to do 
it? You know in the olden time a married woman had to go 
to her husband if she wanted money, and ask for it; or steal 
it out of his trousers' pocket. (Laughter.) And she would be 
asked " what did you buy with that last quarter I gave you." 
(Laughter.) 

Now the question is a matter of money. Are we worth all 
this money? If we were only a subway we could get millions. 
(Laughter.) But we are not worth as much money as parks, 
subways and sidewalks. We are just women. As Miss Strachan 
has said, we buy where we can get our things cheapest,, and 



EQUAL TAY FOR EQUAL WORK 413 

it seems to be good policy that women come cheap. We are poor, 
and we are glad to get almost anything. It is very silly, and very 
poor policy in us. We ought to get our prices higher and per- 
haps we could enhance our value. I don't blame these women 
who are going into business. You know all the rich people are 
merchants. Over on the other side the French are merchants. 
They are hard headed, and keen and shrewd. You can't fool them; 
you can't get ahead of them. And I tell you we have lots of head 
for business — I haven't any — but some of the rest have — and I 
want to see these business women going into business ; going in 
with nerve and going in to win, and becoming great in finance, 
and making these men sit up and take notice. That is all that will 
make them look up to us — to make a lot of money. And I be- 
lieve we are going to get it; and then women won't have to worry 
about earning their own living. (Applause.) 

I am not afraid of the feminizing of the schools. There has 
been a lot of talk about that. The men who are talking that 
way don't understand us women. To them we are most mys- 
terious things. We have nearly come up to them in a few 
years. They don't understand us. They don't know anything 
about us; we are mysteries. But, just the same we have 
the same feelings as they have; and if they will only take us as 
they do themselves, and treat us as they do another fellow, 
they will find we are all right. (Applause.) 

Somebody in defining the law of progress, said " we get along 
by having the old hardshells die off." Now, my friends, we 
don't want anybody to die before his time; but if a few of these 
people opposing this bill will die off, we will get it. (Applause.) 

Hon. James A. Foley: — In the public press about a month ago, 
appeared a statement of one of the Commissioners of the Board 
of Education, who said in the debate on the resolution of Com- 
missioners, that he fixed the limit of efficiency, intellectually and 
physically, of the women teachers of this city at five years. 
As I glance over the audience to-night, in which I see so much 
evidence, so many living documents refuting that statement, I 
am sure that that gentleman knows very little about educa- 
tional matters — far less than he knows about one of the South- 
ern boroughs of the city. He was entirely wrong. 

As the father of the equal pay bill last year, I naturally felt 
an interest in it this year; although it appears to have been 
kidnapped from Albany and transferred to New York City, 
to the tender mercies of the Board of Education. I have been 
wondering in all this talk of investigation, why the male 
teachers have not demanded an investigation of the popularity 
of the equal pay bill in the Legislature for the last three years. 
(Applause.) We have heard a good deal about bribes in Al- 
bany, of the thousands that are supposed to be in certain meas- 



414 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ures that have been introduced there; but let me tell everybody 
here, and let me assure the members of any male teachers' as- 
sociation, that the only reason, and the only foundation for the 
success and popularity of the equal pay bill at Albany, was the 
earnest desire on the part of legislators to correct an injustice 
that had been done to the women teachers of New York City, 
and to remedy an inconsistency which existed in the salary 
schedules in the school system of this city. 

I feel that the women teachers of this city are the most 
efficient and loyal and effective servants that the city has. We 
hear a good deal of American fair play and the protection of 
its laws — and it is due mainly to the teachers of this city that 
the principle has been inculcated in American manhood. But 
if the treatment the women teachers have been receiving from 
the city authorities is American fair play, then let there be 
reform immediately along those lines. 

The Board of Education seems to be awakening to the in- 
evitable; and I think that if the vote for equal pay, as evi- 
denced in the March meeting of the Board of Education, indi- 
cates anything, it indicates that the increased pay for the women 
teachers of this city, and the broad principle of equal pay, will 
soon be a reality. (Applause.) 

Hon. Reuben L. Gledhill: — My dear Miss Strachan and ladies 
and gentlemen: " While the hour is late, it is but early to some 
of the nights we have spent fighting for your cause. (Ap- 
plause.) The last remembrance I have is of being on the firing 
line, with my colleague. Assemblyman Smith, at something 
like three o'clock of a Sunday morning in the Murray Hill 
Hotel battling to put your proposition in the New York Char- 
ter; and we succeeded in doing it. (Applause.) This wasn't 
a place for oratory relative to your bill. We were alone; and 
while others slept, we were working for you. We expect to 
win, and we expect you to win. 

Remember this: he is not the best general that wins the 
most victories; but he is the best that survives defeat after 
defeat and organizes victory at the end from the experience 
of those defeats. (Applause.) 

You will in the end, I think, be very much like the warriors 
that Napoleon lined up for inspection. One of the inspectors 
said: 'These must have been heroic men; some have no arms, 
others are without limbs, and others are blind. What became 
of the men that inflicted these severe injuries on these noble 
warriors?' And the French general touched his hat and said: 
'They are all dead, sir.* (Applause.) 

And so will all our opponents be dead when we have finished 
with them. (Applause.) 




Hon. George S. Davis, 
Fatheb of State-wide "Equal Pay for All Civil Service eA- 



PLOYEES," 1909. 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 415 

Hon. Miraeeau L. Towns : — Madam President, ladies and gentle- 
men; and indomitable Amazonians: 

I believe that you all know where I stand on this qviestion. 
It will be unnecessary here to elaborate my opinions and con- 
victions as to what salary a woman should receive for doing 
the same work that a man is called upon to do. What I wish 
to speak about in the few moments I shall consume, is, first, to 
give you my congratulations for the most excellent organiza- 
tion which you have perfected for the purpose of spreading 
this propaganda of simple justice. The aggregation of intel- 
ligence, and beauty, and courage, which is congregated here 
to-night to attend this festival cannot be matched anywhere in 
this country; and that means anywhere in the world. History 
does not recall an assembly, or an association similar to that 
which graces this occasion to-night. Where would you find 
so much intelligence, so much modesty, so much true female 
worth and beauty, as the most contracted vision would have 
beheld here this evening? 

This question of equal pay is one which the mind of this 
community is not exactly prepared to receive; and it is one 
which you must expect to have slowly inculcated to that con- 
viction which will result in a majority which permits public 
opinion siding with you. Now, you can only do that by organ- 
ization. Miss Strachan said here in her remarks, that on the 
first occasion when you requested an audience of the members 
of the Board of Education to listen to the demands of the school 
teachers of this city, only two attended. Afterwards, and only 
after the very short campaign in which the Interborough As- 
sociation transferred its base of operation from Albany, and 
came to front its enemies right at their very hearthstone, after 
a short preparation — only one meeting having been held at 
Carnegie Hall, and that meeting having been shunned by the 
Chief Magistrate of the City at that time, after he had given 
us a solemn promise to appear — we were able to go again be- 
fore the Board of Education with far different results. Our 
only regret is that we had induced the Mayor to appoint four 
women upon the Board in the expectation that they, at least, 
would appreciate the seriousness of the svibject which con- 
cerned their sisters. We found that three of them were not 
equal to the occasion, and could not rise to the emergency. 
From some influence which no person can define, they cast 
their votes against you, still it is recorded that sixteen fearless 
members of the Board stood up for right and justice, and had 
their names counted in favor of this vital question. (Ap- 
plause.) 

If that was defeat, it was not dishonorable. I cannot recall 
any great public question involving the expenditure of millions 



4i6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

of dollars, that has within the last year come so near its suc- 
cess as this question of equal pay, which came before a Board 
that had been picked, I might almost say, for three years, ever 
since you began your agitation, for the purpose of defeating 
this very question. But so eloquent had been your argument 
and so just was your cause, that some of these very members 
turned at the vital moment in your favor, and but for the de- 
sertion of those whom you naturally counted to be your friends, 
you would have had a settlement of this question. 

Now, I notice that those whom you seem to think are op- 
posing you, and who have the power to give you this success, 
are so afraid of the gentle influence, the persuasive influence 
that you will exert over them, that they shun and avoid you. 
For they know that if they come within the circumference and 
periphery of your influence, and listen to your plea for justice, 
simple justice, and equality, they will be convinced. 

And as it is to some extent a political question, and as our 
affairs are presided over by politicians, and as it is not exactly 
settled whether the majority of public opinion is on your side 
or not, and as it involves an expenditure of some millions of 
dollars which must be raised by taxation, these people, al- 
though convinced of the justice of your cause, are afraid to 
advocate it at this moment. Therefore, I say to you, as you 
have not the power of suffrage, as you have only the power of 
organization, and as you have perfected an organization that 
is not afraid to maintain yovir rights in good or evil report, that 
you still further perfect that organization. Only in work — in- 
domitable and unwearying work — can you achieve success. 

I believe that the next time the votes of the Board of Edu- 
cation are counted, if you will keep on working as I have sug- 
gested, and keep the propaganda before the people, and spread 
the light, that the majority will be just as great on the other 
side as it was against you at the last vote. (Applause.) 

Everybody is agreed that there is something in the gentler 
sex which peculiarly fits it to instil instruction into the infant 
or unformed mind; to awaken in the children the noblest senti- 
ments, to inspire them on the road which ambition selects; to 
give them gentle character; to give them respect; all of which 
go to make up good citizenship. From time immemorial, from 
the time of Moses, — our friend here stated a few examples, 
many more might be stated — the gentle, influence of woman's 
mind and woman's hope and woman's unselfish, undying work 
has produced the greatest products in efficient and useful men 
— men whose lives have made mile-posts on the road of human 
progress. And nowhere is that influence on character en- 
countered with such convincing force as in America — as seen 
in the history of our progress, our wealth, our prosperity, and 
our almost unlimited power. So that, although our opponents 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 417 

in the Board of Education may say in their fear, and in their 
grasping for feeble arguments, that men are more efficient in 
instructing the youthful man, they are refuted by thousands of 
instances in history; refuted by the very facts which form the 
foundation of the progress, of the development and wealth of 
this country. 

So those arguments will be finished in this way, and there 
will be nothing left but the miserly argument that it will in- 
crease the budget. Now, that amounts to nothing, because, 
ladies, I say that you are the budget, that you train the citizen, 
that you take these rough masses of humanity that come from 
foreign shores without any ethical development, that you take 
thern and give them ideas of morality, that you develop their 
minds, that you make of them the citizens of the future, that 
you give to them that power to discriminate in their citizenship 
which makes for their happiness, their virtue, and their man- 
hood. It i-s to you women teachers of this community and 
other communities, but mostly of this community — this door- 
way of foreign immigration — to whom these young people come 
whose minds have, I might say, lain fallow for generations. 
They come here oppressed by poverty, to find the doors of 
education open to them. They go home at night and see the 
squalor and poverty of their parents; and next morning they 
go into our palatial schools and come within the influence of 
refined and cultivated women; and are inspired to nobler en- 
deavors. And if there is one spark of manhood in them, if 
they have any of the attributes of the Creator, it is you who 
form and mold them into the perfection of action. 

So, as I said before, you can count absolutely on your suc- 
cess. Keep up your organization. Present boldly your ideas 
before Mayor Gaynor, as you did before Mayor McClellan, and 
if he shuns you for fear of the gentle influence and convincing 
propositions that you place before him, see that he does not 
escape you, even though he take refuge with Mr. Frey, the rat- 
catcher. (Laughter.) Because this is only one of the great 
questions that confront us, and as the reverend gentleman very 
properly said, in its achievement and in the action that you take 
for its achievement, perhaps greater things will come than the 
mere sanction of equal pay for equal work. Woman will go up 
one step higher in power and in the respect of her fellow-men 
and sisters, and that, I say, is a thing for which we may de- 
voutly wish. (Applause.) 

Mr. Daniel Friseie, Democratic Leader of Assembly: — It will 
give me great pleasure to aid you in achieving what undoubtedly 
is your right, and is a measure of justice too. No citizen of 
this country of ours, and least of all a legislator or a states- 
man, can be insensible to the splendid service which the teach* 



4i8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ers of our country have rendered through all its long and 
glorious history. Three great influences are building up the 
framework of the character of our American citizen. The 
church, naturally and properly first; the school, and the press. 
I am proud to belong to the latter, and I believe that we are 
doing something each day to aid in the cause. But no one can 
be insensible of the powerful influence which you exert, — an 
influence which affects not only the individual student as you 
train and develop his powers of reason, his faculties, his grasp 
of those principles which underlie the success of every young 
man; but, my friends, there is more to it than the benefit of 
the inspiration which you give to the individual. The founders 
of our government, realizing that its success through all time 
must rest upon the intelligence, ability and_integrity of its 
citizens, wisely provided for our school system. And from that 
day until this, they have liberally and generously supported it. 
In the legislature of the State of New York^ a proposition for 
schools elicits no objection from any man. The more liberal 
they are, the more fully we feel we are doing our duty to our 
State. And now, my friends, if that be true, it must equally 
be trv:e that those who have in charge the youth of our State, 
are entitled to the greatest consideration, and our high respect 
and esteem. 

I think there is no American who does not look with pride 
upon the past history of his country. Certainly we in the 
great City of New York, and in the State of New York, have 
reason to feel proud of our accomplishments during the past 
century. But, my friends, much as we have advanced in com- 
merce, in manufactures, in the building up of a city which is 
fast becoming the great financial center of the world; in the 
endowment of our libraries, of our art galleries, in the advance- 
ment of science, and education; there is one acme of greatness 
which we are yet to achieve. I believe that we are to develop 
here and that it will be our greatest test of greatness, the typi- 
cal ideal citizen. The citizen who will have as his inspiration 
the elevation of womanhood; and the realization of the father- 
hood of God and the brotherhood of man. And in that de- 
velopment, in that glorious elevation of our state, no one will 
render greater influence toward that desired result than the 
women teachers of the City and State of New York. (Ap- 
plause.) 

Hon. Timothy Healy: — Ladies and gentlemen: You certainly 
have my sympathy, for fair play and justice. I have been fight- 
ing for twenty-five years for that principle; and I want to see 
the teachers of this city get a fair deal; which they are not 
getting. I know probably more of the situation, not here alone, 
but in Chicago — where a namesake, Margaret Healy, is doing 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 419 

sterling work — and in other cities, than you. And you ladies 
are to be congratulated on the splendid organization that you 
have. 

I am in favor of equal pay, aiad better pay, all around. (Ap- 
plause.) I will go further and say that I am in favor of votes 
for women. (Applause.) If you had a vote, and the privilege 
of the ballot, you have the organization, and you would make 
some of our political friends sit up and take notice. (Applause.) 

I am glad that some of our legislators are coming around to 
our way of thinking; and I think we will have more of them 
coming around. You have even members of the Board of Edu- 
cation here to-night. Well, I don't care to say anything about 
the Board of Education, but I have my own opinion of them, 
and the least said about them, the better. (Laughter.) I have 
another cause of my own with the gentlemen, and have had for 
a long time — the janitors. You know something about the 
janitor system; which is a disgrace to the City of New York 
and to the Board of Education; and political influence is re- 
sponsible for that situation. 

Then why do they question about giving you a few more mil- 
lions of dollars for equal pay? We have had administrations 
in the past in this city, that would steal that amount in a few 
months. (Laughter.) There is no getting away from that. 
I am telling you what I have said from a truck in this city, and 
I will say it again. 

Now, my friends, I represent a labor organization. I am 
president of the International Brotherhood of State Firemen, 
and also delegate of the Central Federation of this State. 

If the labor organizations have their say, you can bet your 
last dollar that you would have them with you, ninety per 
cent. 

My friends, there is too little consideration given to women 
in this country. I know there is a prejudice against women 
entering the industrial field; I myself feel that way to a cer- 
tain extent. But there are other fields, other lines of business, 
where they are a necessity, where they should be in the great 
majority. And if it is true, as one of your speakers has said 
to-night, that the best of them are not going into teaching, I 
don't blame them. It is a sad state of aflfairs, because the chil- 
dren — my children and every other man's children — should have 
the best, and the best is none too good for the future American 
citizens. (Applause.) I have five children attending school, 
and they are taught by women. I want them to be taught by 
women. These women I depend on for the molding of the 
young minds and character of my children — of all children in 
our public schools; and the women who do this work are en- 
titled to a great deal more than they are getting now. It was 
said here a few moments ago that hod carriers got two dollars 



420 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

a day. Why, my friends, a hod carrier in this city gets $3.40, 
(Laughter.) 

Only last night I learned of a girl who came home last week 
and threw her pay envelope down and it showed she drew 
twenty-five dollars for her week's work in a mill. I asked, " Do 
they make that much?" and she said, "They don't like to have 
us make $25 a week, but we get on an average $21 to %22," 
Now, this girl probably spent a few months in learning to be- 
come a weaver, and these teachers have to devote years to 
preparing themselves for their work; and then what do they 
get for it? There is no encouragement, and I don't wonder 
that the clever young women refuse to go in and work for the 
Board of Education. There is not a woman teaching in New 
York, that if she turned her attention in other directions, would 
not earn more money, and get along better. 

I would like to make a good talk to you, but it is late. You 
may depend on it, when you go to Albany, or anywhere else 
where we can help you, we will be with you, and you will have 
our sympathy and support, and may God speed your success. 
(Applause.) 

Hon. Alfred E. Smith: — Miss Strachan, ladies and gentlemen: 
At this late hour, it is not my purpose to make a speech. I 
feel like one of the Committee on " Equal Pay," and I think 
I ought to report as to what has happened and what has not 
happened since our last dinner. Unfortunately we have gotten 
into a situation where we have not been able to do anything 
for about four or five months. I think it will be remedied 
before long. We got into that position on this account: The 
well known and well defined policy of the Governor with re- 
gard to the right of localities to fix salaries, has been the prin- 
cipal stumbling block. In other words, in the proposed char- 
ter, the Governor wants eliminated from the Charter all ref- 
erence to salary. That applies to the police and fire depart- 
ments, and the school teachers. He wants the locality of 
Greater New York, as he does all other localities of this kind 
in the State left with entirely free hands to fix the salary of 
every person that draws money from the public treasury. That, 
of course, necessitates the repeal of the D'avis bill. And the 
more I hear about the question of equal pay, the more I am 
convinced that the Davis act should be repealed. (Applause.) 
I think that this infernal situation that we are up against to- 
day, came about in connection with the Davis law, and that it 
should never have gone on the statute books, because it pro- 
vided for this inequality, this injustice we are fighting, and 
waging this battle against to-day. (Applause.) Now, as to the 
arguments against our proposition, there are really none. Two 
classes of men we have to contend with. Only last Tuesday 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 421 

I looked over across the table in Albany to. my friend Foley; 
I lit a cigar and fell back in the chair; we were having it all 
over again. For the fortieth time I heard the arguments of 
the male school teachers. Their opposition to the proposition 
is a very simple one. It Is entirely selfish. But it can be un- 
derstood in a few minutes. They do not want the cost of 
education in this city to get so large that it may prevent them 
from getting more pay at some future time. (Applause.) 

There is another fellow that comes along to help him out. 
That is the man that is making the real trouble for us. He is 
the man that is what you call a professional kicker against 
everything. He is president of some taxpayers' association 
some place, and he represents a large body of citizens that buy 
a house at $S down and $1.25 a week; and until paid for, he is 
against everything, unless it is some immediate improvement 
on the block where his house stands, the expense of which is 
to be borne by the city at large. (Applause.) 

Now, to-night I see the thing in a better light than I saw it 
this time a year ago. If the charter is enacted into law, there 
is no doubt about the repeal of the Davis bill, and it will not 
be enacted into law unless it contains the simple little pro- 
vision that Senator Gledhill told you about — the night it took 
us until three o'clock in the morning to have it put into the 
charter. It doesn't say equal pay; but it says that the Board 
of Estimate and Apportionment, with the co-operation of the 
Board of Aldermen, shall fix the salaries, and in no instance 
shall that salary differ because of the sex of the incumbent. 
(Applause.) 

I see the thing in a brighter light to-night, for another reason. 
I have the greatest confidence in the present Mayor of the 
City of New York. (Applause.) I believe he has taken hold 
of the affairs of this great city in a way that has instantly made 
him a national figure. (Applause.) And I do not think he can 
possibly be consistent with that record so far accomplished, if 
he allows his term of office to expire without giving some 
attention to this great question that has agitated the State for 
four years back. (Applause.) And I think, I feel, I hope, that 
when we meet again, one year from now, we will not be re- 
porting upon the question; but we will be congratulating each 
other upon its accomplishment. (Applause.) 

Hon. Theodore Sutro: — Of course there is an enormous amount 
that might be said on this subject. I agree with Grady and 
the other speakers that have addressed you this evening. The 
bare annunciation of the proposition seems to prove itself: 
" Equal pay for equal work." Why, how can any argument be 
used for that? Suppose you put it the other way: Unequal 
pay for equal work. Isn't that an absurdity on its face? The 



422 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

principles of political economy have been invoked by the learned 
Commission appointed by Mayor McClellan in his dying hours 
(laughter) of supply and demand. 

Now they say the women teachers are crowding out the men. 
I do not imagine that the school board would like to have this 
reflection cast upon them; that they seek inferior instruction 
because it is cheaper; that they seek women because they work 
for less, which naturally presupposes inferior work, in the most 
important work that the community can be engaged in, the 
rearing and educating of her future citizens. Besides, the old 
maxim, the old doctrine of Adam Smith in his " Wealth of 
Nations," which he enunciated 150 years ago, has been ex- 
ploded as false. It may be applied to sugar and dry goods, 
perhaps, but not to human beings. That the labor market is 
entirely regulated by supply and demand, I have no time to go 
into. 

Then there is the talk about saving so many millions to the 
city. I say to you ladies, whether it costs a million or tv/enty 
millions more to back up your efforts in trying to uphold our 
Republic, the price is cheap, but I haven't time to go into that 
subject either. (Applause.) 

The subject I do want to say a word or two about is the 
absurd proposition, that of the " living wage," especially of the 
"family wage." Now, what does that mean? Is the State a 
charitable organization. (Applause.) Has the State a right to 
use our money for the purpose of supporting a family? If 
that is true, then is it right for the State to do its work im- 
properly? If it is going to support the family, it ought to sup- 
port the whole family, not a part of it. Therefore the salary 
of the male teacher ought to be gauged by the size of the 
family, and each one ought to get a different salary. If a man 
has twelve children, he certainly ought to have more pay than 
a man who has but two, even though both men be in the same 
grade, and are of the same efficiency. (Applause.) 

I read a communication in the " Evening Post," in which a 
learned gentleman says, that the family wage is so important 
that even a young man, though he is not married, ought to re- 
ceive the family wage, in order to enable him to marry. Now, 
what is that for a proposition? (Laughter.) I understand the 
women teachers are not permitted to marry. Therefore the 
State penalizes marriage, by prohibiting their marriage, and it 
sets a premium against marriage by giving the young unmar- 
ried man the same as the married man. (Applause.) I claim, 
ladies and gentlemen, that if that proposition is carried to its 
last analysis, the salary of each individual teacher ought to 
vary from time to time. When the first-born appears, it should 
be so-and-so much, and when the next one comes, there should 
be so much increase, and where there are twelve, it should be 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 423 

twelve times as much. If it is the purpose of the State to give 
a family w^age, each member of the family ought to be sup- 
ported, and not merely a part of it. 

Now, that of itself is a barren argument. Still, it is the 
most frequently used argument I have heard in connection with 
this question. 

The proposition which is advanced in that direction reminds 
me of a story — and it is a true story — of a millionaire physi- 
cian in this city, who married the daughter of a multi-million- 
aire. When the first-born appeared in the house, the grand- 
father was so elated that he sent his daughter a check for fifty 
thousand dollars, and he promised to repeat that with every 
new-comer. I don't know whether I ought to continue the 
story in this presence, but it is a fact — I knew the gentleman — 
he had the largest number of children in a short time of any 
man that ever I heard of. And the result of that generosity 
on the part of the grandfather was, that this eminent surgeon 
celebrated so constantly and so hilariously the frequent ar- 
rivals of fifty thousand dollar checks, that he finally drank 
himself to death. (Laughter.) 

Let that be a warning to the school board of what their 
proposition of unequal pay, what they mean by family wage, 
will result in. Let it also be a warning, and even a greater 
warning, to the male teachers themselves, as to what a future 
awaits them if their salary is kept on the family wage basis. 

As to the question of cost, it would be far better if the city 
were to pay these teachers better and not build such expensive 
and luxurious school-houses. They could then pay the women 
teachers at least the same wages that are paid to the hod- 
carriers and other laborers that work on the buildings; and 
this they are not receiving to-day, because a hod-carrier, as 
I gather it from the report of the Commissioner of Education, 
receives $2 a day. As far as I have looked into the question, 
the average pay of the woman teacher in the United States is 
only $1.50 a day, which is the pay of the ordinary laborer. 

The best place is to look always for an object lesson in these 
matters, and now, there is one district in this country, and it is 
a district where the proposition of equal pay has been suc- 
cessfully carried on. That is, the District of Columbia, where 
there is no distinction between the pay of men and women; 
where the question of unequal pay does not arise; where the 
teachers are sleeted as men or women are needed; and not from 
any motives of economy; and I hope that the system will con- 
tinue there for all time to come. Now, I want to say in closing, 
this: that most maxims are false; they really are; they gen- 
erally state an untruth. Now, I don't. The statement that 
"might makes right" is, in my opinion, absolutely absurd I 
think quite the converse is true. I have never yet found that 



424 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

right didn't make might in the end. And, ladies, the right is 
on your side, and the might will come into your hands event- 
ually, and the victory will be yours. (Applause.) 

Mr. Siosson: — Instead of making a speech, I simply want to 
assure you of my great pleasure at being here with you, and 
my very great surprise that I am permitted to be here to eat 
this dinner with you. Because I know something already of 
the customs of these coast people, and I know it is not custom- 
ary for the two sexes to dine together. I was very much 
afraid when I was invited, that I should find that this was one 
of those banquet halls where they have a gallery, and] that the 
men would be put up in the gallery, where we would simply 
have to watch the ladies eat, listen to their speeches, and with 
our bright eyes, rain influence down upon them. (Laughter.) 
This is one of the most peculiar customs I have encountered 
here. You know that we of the interior tribes do Hot have this 
custom. In the hills, men and women associate together very 
frequently and very commonly. In Wyoming, where I came 
from, men and women are fond of being together (laughter). 
They like each other. They quite commonly go so far as to 
marry. (Laughter.) They marry much more commonly there 
than among the coast tribes (laughter). They go to the same 
schools; they go to church together, and they use the same 
books; they talk the same language, and understand each other, 
to a certain extent. They share, indeed, a common life; not 
segregated as here. They even go to the polls together. (Ap- 
plause.) 

We have, as a consequence, of course, no such question as 
that which agitates the people of New York, in regard to un- 
equal pay for equal work. (Applause.) Equal pay for equal 
work is simply a corollary of equal suffrage. (Applause.) 

I simply want to call your attention to one fact in physical 
geography which I have not seen in the text books. That is, 
the fact that men and women get further apart as one travels 
eastward. It is just as if one started at the pole, and the lines 
of longitude gradually separated as they went towards the 
equator. At least they say they do that way; I have never 
tried it. But I know that the other is true, because through 
coming from the west towards the east, in New York I found 
a definite line of demarcation between men and women. The 
women teachers eat by themselves; and the men teachers, if 
they have a disposition to eat, eat by themselves. (Laughter.) 
There is quite a difference, as I said, here, and suppose you 
go further and cross the sea. Suppose you go to France; there 
the men and women practically belong to a different race, from 
different training and education. The man may have been very 
liberal in his ideas, and his wife has been differently trained; 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 425 

one may perhaps be an atheist, and the other may perhaps be 
a bigamist (Laughter.) At any rate, they have learned a dif- 
ferent style of thinking, so a man is not on speaking terms with 
his wife, however much they may love each other. One has 
been enjoying freedom of the world, while perhaps the other 
has been immured in a convent school. If we go still further, 
say we go to Turkey, we find the women, creatures of the 
harem and we find the men, brutes. Suppose we go still fur- 
ther, and we visit New Caledonia, there the difference is greater 
still, for the woman is a slave, and the man a brute. It is 
simply a matter of longitude. In New Caledonia, it is consid- 
ered improper for a brother and a sister to eat together; in 
New York it is considered improper for a brother and a sister 
to go to school together. It is simply a question of longitude. 
You have even in this town separate books of instruction; you 
have a school where masculine geography is taught, and a 
school where feminine geography is taught. 

I hear there is some talk about changing the name of Nor- 
mal College. It seems to me in some way it would be a bad 
change, because that name means so much. It has such a 
value for its historical interest because the training of what 
we call the normal woman was by our ancestors considered to 
be abnormal. They considered it was undesirable for woman 
to learn Latin and Greek; that it was impossible, because of 
her limited intellect, that she should learn mathematics. They 
considered it improper for her to learn physiology; they con- 
sidered it useless for her to learn political economy. But in 
these later daj^s, those things have become so commonly recog- 
nized as part of women's education, that the place where they 
were imparted was very appropriately named " Normal Col- 
lege." (Applause.) 

Rev. Maurice Hareis : — I come from a people who have always 
placed the teacher in a very high rank. In fact, one of the 
adages of our sages runs: "He who honors his teacher, hon- 
ors God." 

Ladies, you are teachers, but in another sense than in the 
school-room, you are carrying on a campaign of education. 
You will find out, ladies, that the best wa)^ of reaching the 
truth of a great project, or cause, is to establish its relation- 
ship to other causes. Very few causes stand isolated and alone. 
They are each a part of larger truths. In the effort you are 
making, it is not merely a matter of the equal pay of teachers; 
it is not merely a matter of equal pay between men and women 
in other walks of life, it is not only an economic question; it 
is a social one. Not socialistic, but sociological. And when 
you are fighting for this equality of pay, it is part of a larger 
effort for equality, for which woman has been fighting from 



426 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the beginning. It is a chapter in the story of your emancipa- 
tion, that began in the olden time, in the time when woman 
was subordinate; when woman was humiliated; when if she 
was a power, she was a power behind the throne, but rarely 
on it. And yet when we read in history, the story of the 
achievement of woman when she had so little chance, when 
she had so little power, we find that whenever there was a 
great man, there was always a great woman behind him. (Ap- 
plause.) I don't mean in the French sense, that whenever there 
was mischief, you had to seek the woman; but whenever there 
was greatness, you had to seek the woman. If it was Alfred 
the Great, King of England; or Samuel, the great prophet, or 
Francis Bacon, the great philosopher, we are always told that 
a great mother in each of these instances explained the genius 
of the individual. Behind Mohammed, we find Kadisha. And 
if these are instances of what woman has achieved in her sub- 
ordinate, and in a sense, enslaved condition, imagine what she 
may not achieve in the coming day, in the era of her thorough 
emancipation. In making this effort for equal pay, you are 
not only fighting for pay, you are not only fighting for teach- 
ers, you are fighting for equality, and for womankind. (Ap- 
plause.) And please understand, ladies, that when you are 
fighting, if you are fighting, you are not fighting as against 
men, the men are with you, fighting for and with you. It is 
impossible for us to dissociate our interests. A man cares 
as much for the welfare of his daughters as for the welfare of 
his sons. And if you study the story of the great struggle for 
the emancipation of women, you will find how much men have 
done for the achievement of that cause. 

But, ladies, just a word of warning. In seeking equality, 
in seeking to be brought to the level of man, take care that it 
means being brought up to the level of man, and not being 
brought down to the level of man. However much you may 
win, I don't want you to win this equality in a way that you 
may lose more than you gain. I would never wish that time 
to pass away when man should no longer need to put around 
woman his chivalry or protection; that he should say she is 
equal and alone, and she does not need me, and she need not 
look to the man, as she naturally does to-day, for his support, 
for his guidance, for his seat in the car. (Laughter.) For 
those attentions that we give to women explain the whole 
story of knighthood and chivalry, because whenever the time 
shall come that woman is so much the equal of man that man 
shall say "that obligation is over; I need not do this for her, 
or that "; then it would seem to me that one of the most 
beautiful sentiments in life will have passed away. 

One word more. You will find, ladies, in life, that whenever 
we work hard for anything, we do not always achieve quite 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 427 

the thing that we are working for. Life is so full of unex- 
pected surprises. It works out in ever so many unexpected 
ways. Providence fulfills itself in mysterious ways. But when 
we do work hard for a cause, and loyally, and devotedly, though 
we may not always achieve the thing we set out to achieve, we 
find because we have loyally tried, that something else has 
arisen, something unexpected has been achieved, far more 
precious than the thing we originally set out for. 

Now, you have gone into this fight. You have been de- 
feated on a few occasions, but you have never known that you 
were defeated. (Applause.) And when we don't know that we 
are defeated, we are not defeated. (Applause.) You are get- 
ting on in this struggle, and every year, at your banquet, there 
is going to be reported progress toward that achievement. 
It may possibly be, ladies, that in the ultimate outcome, some- 
thing different may result than that which you expect, than 
that for which you are working. I said this is a campaign of 
education. It is part of the great sociological question, and 
all sorts of unexpected vistas of the relation of woman in the 
world and in life, may be the result of your effort, and through 
your fight. And if you may not in the end just achieve this 
particular thing, your effort may achieve a something for 
womankind far larger, and far more valuable. 

That you may achieve what you are seeking, and that you 
may achieve a something more precious still is my heartfelt 
wish to you to-night. (Applause.) 



PART THREE— CHAPTER ONE 
DEMOCRACY EDITORIALS 

Now, if we could get Grace Strachan to go tiger shooting in 
India, while Mr. Roosevelt is after lions in Africa, it looks as 
though we might have a little peace for a while.— Brooklyn Times. 

DEAL JUSTLY WITH THE 14,000 WOMEN TEACHERS IN 
MANHATTAN SCHOOLS 

This morning, at ten o'clock, in the City Hall, the Mayor of New 
York will be called upon to veto or approve a legislative bill which 
deeply concerns the 17,000 teachers and the 800,000 school children 
of the greater city. 

It is Senate bill No. 1210, and it is designed to give the women 
teachers of New York the same pay as that now received by the 
men teachers for the same work. 

This is now the law in Chicago and other large cities of the 
country. It was the law, working to excellent effect, in the fine 
schools of Brooklyn before Brooklyn was consolidated with New 
York. 

This Senate bill No. 1210 is the successor of three substantially 
similar bills which in three successive years have been passed by 
overwhelming majorities in the Legislature at Albany. In 1907 
the Senate voted it by 45 to i, the Assembly by 105 to 15. It was 
vetoed by Governor Hughes. In 1908 the Senate approved the 
bill by a two-thirds majority, but it was smothered in the House 
against tl^ expressed wish of 104 out of 150 members that it be 
brought to a ballot. In the session of 1909, just closed, the Senate 
voted the bill by 38 to 3, and the House by 127 to 14. 

It awaits now the approval of the Mayor and the Governor. 

Behind the Woman's bill, then, there stand in cordial approval 
three overwhelming majorities of the State Legislature, 14,000 of 
the 17,000 teachers of the greater city, a practically unanimous 
Board of Aldermen, the autographed signatures of 20,000 taxpayers 
of New York, a long list of the leading merchants, business men 
and publicists of the city, and of a nearly unanimous array of 
federated labor unions representing more than 200,000 citizens and 
voters. 

Opposed to the bill there appears in the open several organiza- 
tions of men and taxpayers and a majority of the Board of Edu- 
cation who with almost unseemly haste, after a discussion of four 
minutes and thirty-seven seconds, disposed of this vital measure. 

428 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 429 

Representatives of the Board of Education and of the men's 
associations will be present this morning to ask the mayor to veto 
the bill, and Miss Grace Strachan, at the head of the 14,000 teachers 
and the other organizations, will earnestly urge the mayor to ap- 
prove the measure. 

If the mayor approves the bill, only the governor's signature 
will be needed to make it a law. If the mayor vetoes the bill it 
falls dead until another legislature convenes to revive it. 

The American most sincerely trusts that the mayor will have 
the wisdom, justice and courage to give the bill his emphatic 
approval. 

Surely it would seem proper and just that where three successive 
legislatures, fresh from the people, have so represented the people 
in their overwhelming approval, and where so many taxpayers, 
citizens and laboring men have heartily endorsed the measure of 
common justice and good policy, that one man, as the mayor, or 
as the governor, should not again deny the people what the people 
have so repeatedly and emphatically asked and demanded, through 
their representatives. 

The New York American plants itself first upon the general and 
primary proposition that the salaries doled out to teachers, male 
and female, in New York and elsewhere throughout the schools 
of the country, are a distinct stigma upon the justice, gratitude and 
common sense of the American people. 

That those who perform the holiest and noblest service to the 
Republic should be the poorest paid of all its workers, is a travesty 
upon the judgment and justice of the people. 

The woman teacher in New York begins at a salary of $600.00! 
The women in charge of the public comfort stations have $750.00! 
The scrubwoman appointed by the city gets $750.00! The tele- 
phone girl in the mayor's office gets $1,300.00 a year, with no other 
requirement but to be eighteen years old! The woman teacher, 
with her six or more years of expensive preparation at school, 
must work between seven and eight years at her supreme task be- 
fore she begins to earn what the policeman and the fireman start 
with. — New York American, May 11, 1909. 

TWO BRAVE WOMEN DESERVE WHAT MEN RECEIVE 

Those big-chested, broad-shouldered, manly men who have been 
fighting against equal pay for women teachers, and as vigorously 
fighting for bigger pay for themselves, all on the ground of the 
necessity for avoiding the de-energizing of boys by too much con- 
tact with the feminine quality in the school room, will do well to 
read the story this morning of the cool, brave nerve of Principal 
Mary McClay and Vice-Principal Linda Henderson, of Public 
School No. 91, which saved perhaps 2500 children from panic and 
death. 



430 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

And then, perhaps these manly masculines may be big enougH 
and broad enough, inside, to realize and to confess that New York 
children, boys or girls, could not possibly learn any manlier lessons 
of courage and strength and resource than these brave teachers 
illustrated in that perilous hour, and that it is a shame to rate the 
dollar worth of these splendid women below the level of men 
upon the false basis of feminine weakness and timidity. 

Go to, thou male teacher, and be just!— New York American, 
May 25, 1909. 

EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK IS MERELY EDUCA- 
TIONAL JUSTICE 

The women teachers of New York have called a great mass 
meeting at Carnegie Hall to-night to bring the whole matter of 
EQUAL PAY for EQUAL WORK before the public, and to invite 
full and fair discussion of the merits of this great question before 
the assembling of the legislature and the organization of the new 
municipal administration. 

It is the fair and noble thing to do. The meeting should have 
a great attendance and be followed by great results. 

The American's cordial support of the policy of equal pay for 
equal work has been a cardinal doctrine of its municipal policy. 

Behind the women's earnest and absolutely just appeal there 
stand fourteen thousand of the seventeen thousand teachers of 
New York, three successive ballots of three successive State Legis- 
latures in overwhelming approval, a practically unanimous vote 
of the Board of Aldermen, the autographed signatures of twenty 
thousand legal taxpayers, a long list of leading merchants, busi- 
ness men and publicists, the City Federation of Women's Clubs 
and an array of federated labor unions that include two hundred 
and twenty thousand workingmen of New York. All these and 
Justice ! 

In opposition there is gathered a hopeless minority of teachers, 
one or two special associations of citizens, and a majority vote of 
the Board of Education after hasty and inadequate consideration — 
these and an unjust and foolish prejudice! 

How magnificent the disparity between the woman's just cause 
and the prejudiced opposition that fights it! 

And to the noble minds of honest men and women the disparity 
of the argument is just as great in favor of the women. 

Upon the one side is justice, equity, the open record of equal 
service, good public policy, legislative and popular approval, and 
the acceptable experience of other great cities of the country. 

Upon the other side is sex prejudice, speculative apprehension 
and the sodden cry of money. 

Patrick McCarren, with whom The American rarely agreed, but 




Hon. Robert S. Conklin, 
Father of Assembly "Equal Pay" Bills of 1907 and 1908. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 431 

whose ability it never questioned, frankly and explicitly declared 
after his long experience with the school systems of the metropolis 
that " women make the best teachers in the world." And this 
sentiment The American heartily approves. They are natural 
teachers, pre-destined by instinct and equipment to deal with 
children. It is a tradition ancient as the race and now accepted in 
every theory of heredity that most if not all the great men of the 
world have received their great qualities from the character and 
training of great mothers. And this great fact shrivels into an ab- 
surdity the apprehension that women in the schools " would 
effeminize the children." Woman's spirit and her ideals are in- 
spiring to all youth. 

It is the contact of boy with boy, the Junior Republic of educa- 
tion, that makes men, and not more the teacher behind the desk. 
It was the Iron Duke of Wellington who said that " the battle of 
Waterloo was won on the football fields of Rugby." 

The money argument is ignoble and unworthy of this great city 
dealing with its noblest and mightiest problem. Miss Strachan 
made clear the fact that the four-mill tax needed for the increase 
in the wage was a part of the original charter. It was reduced 
during the Low administration to three mills. The result has been 
insufficient to meet the school needs ever since, and we are likely 
under any circumstances to return to the four-mill tax. 

But what does it count in this world-metropolis — this sum of 
three and one-half millions of dollars — against the greater thing, 
to establish justice, to properly pay good teachers, to renew a good 
spirit in the schools, and to inspire the children of to-day, who are 
the citizens of to-morrow? The issue is too vast and too vital to 
be decided by this sordid weight of money flung into the scale 
against justice, a great civic policy, and the future of the children. 

When the people remember the multiplied millions that have been 
squandered without protest in the greed of corporations and the 
graft of politicians in New York, it sounds infinitely small and 
insincere, this sodden cry of a politician's parsimony. 

The great meeting of to-night should go far to fix public opinion 
in favor of EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK.— New York 
American, December 17, 1909. 

Whether men are better qualified to teach grown-up boys or 
should be employed in certain school classes is not the question. 
Different classifications of work may properly pay different salaries. 
These are questions outside the present movement. What the 
women teachers ask now is, that in the same grade and for the 
same kind of work the same rate of pay shall be set for men and 
women alike. We do not see how that proposition can be justly 
disputed. A teacher should not be penalized simply because she 
is a woman. — Irish-American, December 24, 1909. 



432 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



GRAFT AND MUNICIPAL ECONOMY 

Some very distinguished public servants and others are busying 
themselves in opposing fair play to women teachers on the ground 
that the city cannot afford to be just. 

Neither this city nor any other can afford to be unjust — ^there 
being no other extravagance known to man that is quite so high 
priced. 

But lake a good look at this. 

These eminent gentlemen say the Equal Pay bill is likely to cost 
the city $6,000,000. It will do nothing of the kind, but suppose 
it did. 

The corporations owe the city of New York $27,000,000 in back 
taxes. 

The graft and waste already uncovered in the city departments 
amount to more than $6,000,000 a year. 

The graft in the Catskill water project will be about $60,000,000. 

How do these items foot up? 

We do not hear the eminent gentlemen objecting to any of 
these expenditures. It is only when the women teachers — among 
the most important and worst paid of public servants — ask for a 
little justice that the vision of economy arises at the City Hall. 

Politician contractors must have their graft, corporations must 
steal their taxes, heads of city departments must be supplied with 
automobiles and the women teachers can go whistle for the money 
they earn. 

Is that the way of it? 

If we should stop a small part of the graft we could deal justly 
with these women, build the schoolhouses we need, provide play- 
grounds, tear down the Lung Block and be decent. 

How about stopping the graft, anyway? W^ can if we want 
to.— Call, New York City, May 17, 1909. 

SALARIES IN THE CLASSROOM 

Senator McCarren's bill for the equalization of teachers' salaries 
in the public schools of New York City provides for the elimina- 
tion of the adjectives "male" and "female" from the law under 
which the payrolls are made up. If the bill should be enacted 
the salaries now paid only to men would be paid to all teachers 
doing the same work, regardless of their sex. 

If the wages of men in the public school service are fair re- 
compense for the labor performed, such a measure as Senator 
McCarren's would end the injustice which the city now practices 
towards the women in its teaching corps. Of the fairness and 
propriety of the salary schedule for men no question has been 
raised. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 433 

At any rate, the ridiculous discrimination against teachers on 
account of their sex ought to be ended. — Editorial New York 
Sun, February 12, 1907. 

OUR TEACHERS AT ALBANY 

The representatives of the male teachers of this city did not 
cut much of a figure at Albany yesterday. They were in an awk- 
ward situation as they faced the Assembly Committee and put for- 
ward their arguments against the increase of the pay of their 
women colleagues in the presence of more than 300 of the latter, 
all dressed in their very best clothes. 

Poor Mr. Wellnesley, he could not help it. There was a sug- 
gestion of the dog in the manger when he argued as follows : 
" This bill says that women teachers shall have equal pay for 
equal work, but it says nothing about a woman being able to get 
more than a man. [Loud laughter.] We men teachers want to 
be protected so we can't be reduced." 

This argument brought from Mrs. N. C. Lennan a little later 
the triumphant response that as assistant principal she got the 
magnificent salary of $1600 a year, though she had to supervise 
the work of a man who received $2400, all because of the trifling 
accident of an accident. 

But for true frankness Mr. Cort surpassed all his fellow- 
protestants. He did not mince matters. " If this bill becomes 
law," he said, " it will defer the increase in the men's pay." In 
other words, the self-seeking male persons opposed what their op- 
ponents called a simple act of justice on the ground that it would 
tend to prevent the commission of a further injustice. This con- 
tention suggests that there is a good deal to be said for the theory 
that the reasoning processes of women are different from those 
of persons of the other sex. 

As far as the home rule argument put forward by a representa- 
tive of the Corporation Counsel's office is concerned — that this 
city is the only one in the state in the case of which the legis- 
lature has authority to fix salaries — the ladies and their friends 
might well retort that they had nothing to do with that. It was 
natural that they should accept conditions as they found them and 
fight with the weapons that they had ready to their hands. If the 
city refused to do them justice, and if the law gave them an ap- 
peal to the lawmaking body of the Commonwealth, why should 
they not make it, and if not, why not? 

To ask where the extra money is to come from is to beg the 
question. // an injustice is done to competent, hard working and 
faithful servants of the city, simply because they are women and 
not men, all right minded persons unll be in favor of having it 
put an end to, and hang the expense. — From the Evening Sun, 
Wednesday, February 27, 1907. 



434 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

THE EQUAL PAY BILL VETO 

It was plain to everybody that the mayor would veto the bill 
equalizing the pay of men and women teachers in the public 
schools, or providing " pay for position." But the tone of his 
memorandum shows that the women have won a substantial 
victory. 

To begin with, emphasis is laid by his Honor on the fact that, 
according to certain experts, the proposed change would add $6,- 
000,000 a year to the budget. But, in spite of the other fact that 
this side of the question was aired at the hearing, and on other oc- 
casions, it is clear that it is a very weak argument. " Give us 
justice. That is all we ask," say the women. " Oh, but it would 
be so expensive," say the men. A very lame and ridiculous re- 
joinder. Besides, sordid as the defence is, it would be more con- 
clusive if we lived in a city and state in which strict economy was 
regarded as one of the things earnestly sought after by persons in 
office. 

Well, the ladies don't get the money, not just yet. They must 
go on paying a tax on the accident of birth. They may command 
in the schoolroom, but, when the time for remuneration comes 
around, must realize that in this best regulated of all possible 
worlds doublet and hose is superior to petticoat. 

Now, in a case like this, the main thing is to get attention. 
The women court inquiry, investigation. From the beginning 
their appeal has been to the record of work done. The mayor 
announces that he will appoint a commission to investigate the 
whole question in all its aspects. It is safe to predict this will 
cause jubilation in the camp of the women and gloom among the 
men in the department. 

In the meantime, the opponents of the measure might cast about 
for some new arguments, for there is reason to believe that they 
will be needed before long. — Sun, May I2, igop. 

Whenever we have had an opportunity to explain our cause to 
any judge, from the lowest court to the highest, we have found him 
on our side. — Miss Strachan on the Mayor's Committee of Inquiry. 

Those who demand equal pay for equal work are in the position 
of making an appeal to reason. Their opponents appeal to prej- 
udice. — Evening Sun, June 9, 1909. 

WOMEN, STATUS AND CONTRACT 

The greatest jurist of the last century held that the most im- 
portant step in modern progress was taken when man passed from 
a condition of status to that of contract; when he began to make 
his own bargains, instead of having them made for him, as a mem- 
ber of a clan or family or class. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 435 

The contention of the women teachers, as set forth in the letter 
printed in another column, virtually amounts to this, that, in so 
far as there is discrimination against them, on the ground of sex, 
their relation with the community is not contractual, while that of 
the men is. 

If women are allowed to compete freely with men in any trade, 
profession or calling, and if there is discrimination against them 
in this matter of remuneration, it is plain that the disability of 
which they complain is contrary to the general tendency in the 
direction of equality which began with the first married woman's 
property act. For to set up a married woman as a person with 
property rights apart from her husband was a revolutionary pro- 
ceeding destructive of all discipline and submission. — Sim, January 
31. 1910. 

DIRT CHEAP 

In the course of the discussion in the Board of Education yes- 
terday on the resolution of Mr. Somers providing for equal pay 
for equal work in the department, one of the opponents of the 
proposal put his case this way: 

We appoint very few men teachers now — the positions go to 
women. It is cheaper for the city to have women teachers. The 
cost is everything. If men and women had equal pay we would 
appoint more men and fewer women teachers. 

So at last we have an explanation of the activity of the men in- 
structors. They labor day and night to show the injustice of giv- 
ing a woman the salary that belongs to the office she holds. 

But it is net because they are selfish or self-seeking. Not at all. 
The worthy males look forward to the time when there will be 
no expensive, otherwise male, teachers. For, just as according to 
Gresham's law, bad money drives out good, so cheap teachers will 
drive out dear teachers. The altruists will be completely happy 
when economy, and no other consideration whatever, is the be- 
ginning and end of the city's policy. — Evening Sun, March 17, igio. 



DR. ALLEN ON UNEQUAL PAY 

Dr. William Allen went to scoff and remained to bray. It was 
at a meeting of the Women's Republican Club that he appeared as 
an advocate of unequal pay for equal work in the public schools. 
Some of the women present being earnest supporters of Miss 
Grace Strachan in what they call a fight for justice, were irritated. 
We fail to see why they should have been. The good Doctor is 
the best imaginable ally of his opponents. 

It is a great mistake when you have such a bad case as Dr. 
Allen to give your reasons for the faith that is in you. How 
much more convincing it would have been if he had confined him- 



436 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

self to the triumphant theory that women ought not to be as well 
paid as the men because they were women. There is no conceiv- 
able answer to that 

But no. The dear man digs up an economic theory. The 
woman teacher must get less than the male " for the same reason 
that you pay your cook what you have to pay her and no more. 
It sounds cruel, but it is only the working out of the great law 
of supply and demand." 

What he doesn't see, won't see, or can't see, is just this, that by 
giving the men more pay qua men, the dear old principle of supply 
and demand is made inoperative. It is as if the male sex were 
an infant industry that had to be protected. For if it is assumed 
that equality would drive the men out of the service, then it fol- 
lows, of course, that they and their friends do not think that they 
would have a chance if it were a case of a fair field and no favor. 

Dr. Allen pointed out that the waste of Tammany Hall was 
a negligible quantity compared to the waste of energy that went 
on in groups like the one assembled before him. Of course 
women are never more ridiculous than when, instead of devoting 
all their energy to coddling some manly man, they give some of 
their attention to the task of righting a wrong or putting an end 
to an injustice. — Evening Sun, December i6, 1909. 

THE TEACHERS SALARIES BILL 

The bill which gives to female teachers the same salaries for 
same services as are given to male teachers, has passed the Senate 
with only a single vote against it. Before it can become a law it 
must pass the Assembly. However, it is quite likely that it will 
pass that body without amendment. The bill is now known as the 
White compromise bill. The difference between the one which 
has just received the sanction of the Senate and that which was 
originally introduced is of little consequence. The essential or 
underlying principle was the same in both. And that is that 
there should be like compensation for like service; that, in this 
respect there should be no difference of sexes. 

This is as it should be. There was manifest injustice in this 
preference of sexes. If women were employed as teachers it was 
because they could perform the services required quite as well as 
men. If they could not, then their employment was not justified. 
But it was justified. The moment that justification was made 
then it was clear that either the men were paid a larger sum than 
was proper for the performance of a similar service, or the 
women were not paid enough if the pay of the men was proper. 
Consideration determined that the men teachers were not too 
highly paid. Consequently it followed that the women teachers 
were inadequately remunerated. The hill in question simply does 
justice. — Brooklyn Eagle, April 16, 1907. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 437 



WOMEN TEACHERS 

The charge, often made, that women teachers tend to " feminize " 
boys is vigorously refuted by Professor John Dewey, one of our 
foremost psychologists and educators. " There is," he said, " no 
more efficient body of workers in America than the great army of 
its women teachers." And to the " feminizing " charge he replied, 
" Where are our effeminate boys, if you please ? I have not been 
able to discover them." He calls the whole theory "an English 
pipe-dream." 

Professor Dewey's point is an excellent one. It is quite certain 
that our system of education is not producing efifeminate boys. 
The reason for women's good effect on children is stated by Profes- 
sor Dewey. It is that women have as much executive skill and 
are capable of as high intellectual work as men. Whatever their 
limitations are, they are due to unfavorable social conditions, which 
may be changed, and not to their natural infirmity. Dr. Dewey 
insists that in New York to-day there are women better fitted to 
hold important administrative posts in educational matters than 
the present male incumbents, and that there should be women 
professors in all the universities. — Press, November 10, 1909. 

MORAL ASTIGMATISM 

We imagine that disinterested people will read with a feeling 
of mixed censure and amusement the statement made by the men 
teachers of the elementary schools, in a pamphlet addressed to the 
Board of Education, in regard to the subject of equal pay for men 
and women teachers. 

They, the men, have come out against equal pay. Perfectly 
natural action, based on naive selfishness, is likely to provoke a 
smile, mixed with unfavorable criticism. The men are afraid, no 
doubt, that if the women receive more pay they (the men) will not 
receive so much, or that, at any rate, their pay will not be so likely 
to be raised. 

One of the arguments used by the men teachers against equal 
pay is that such a system would tend to prevent the women marry- 
ing, that it would " involve the establishment of a preferred celibate 
class." In other words, these men fear a system by which women 
may no longer feel themselves forced to marry for economic rea- 
sons. They say, in effect, "keep down the salaries of women, for 
if we give them an opportunity for independence they won't marry 
us." 

Any action such as this on the part of the men teachers which 
tends to limit the growing independence of women is reactionary 
and shortsighted. The fact that so many women are led to marry 
in order to improve their material condition is hateful to our ideals. 



438 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

It is probably true that, under a system of equal pay, where serv- 
ices should be paid for irrespective of sex, some women who now 
marry would remain single. But there are some men to-day who 
remain single because of relative economic independence, which 
they desire to maintain. These men are, however, relatively few. 
Women are as instinctive and as normal as men are, and independ- 
ence which they feared to lose would prevent very few from 
marrying when they could make marriages which were attractive 
to them. Independence of women would improve marriage, since 
fewer women would marry because of necessity. By the same 
means divorce would be decreased, and human happiness would 
have a boom. 

But these wide considerations do not appeal to a body of men 
teachers whom their " interests" have made morally astigmatic. 
Especially from teachers, perhaps, we should demand some element 
of altruism and sympathy with social progress. — Press, February 
21, 1910. 

"DISCRIMINATION" AS AN ISSUE; WHAT IT MEANS 
IN THE MUSICAL WORLD. 

If the United States stands, and has stood, for anything, it is 
against that discrimination which has existed from time immemorial 
in other countries, and which is based on prejudice, which in turn 
is based on ignorance. The United States, ever since its Consti- 
tution was formed, and even before that, upheld the great principle 
that a man or a woman shall be regarded " on the merits," and not 
be condemned or brushed aside on account of race or religion or 
previous condition; that, indeed, in this country humanity should 
have a fresh start, better conditions, and, above all, greater op- 
portunities. 

In nothing has this spirit shown itself more convincingly than in 
the laws passed in our various States, and also by the National 
Government, regarding women. The laws make it impossible for 
a man to transfer his real estate, if he be married, except with the 
consent of his wife, for the law recognizes the fact that in the 
acquisition of property the wife and mother has contributed at 
least a share. 

For years, as we know, in the most advanced country in Europe, 
in England, a woman could acquire no property, even by her own 
efforts, after she was married. It was in the husband's power to 
come in and seize and sell it whenever it so pleased him. While 
in this and other respects we are in this country in advance of 
other nations, it must be admitted that there are still serious prej- 
udices existent which, it is hoped, a more enlightened age will 
remove. 

One of these prejudices is the accepted dictum that no Catholic 
could ever become President of the United States. Another is 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 439 

the unjust social prejudice against the Hebrew. Another is the 
unreasoning prejudice against Asiatics, even when they are highly 
educated, cultured and refined. We still have the disabilities under 
which women labor when they perform the work of men, but do 
not get the pay of men. Finally, we have the social prejudice 
against teachers who are — shameful to us as it is — regarded as 
little better than servants. 

The movement to remove the disabilities of women is world- 
wide. It is active in such far-off countries as China, Persia, 
Turkey; it is active in France, Belgium; it is making headway in 
England; it has started to become active in this country. Back 
of it all is the basic principle of " justice," namely, that there 
shall be no discrimination against a person's work or social condi- 
tion or legal rights on account of sex. 

An instance of this movement was afforded in the appearance 
before the Mayor of the City of New York, the other day, of 
Miss Grace C. Strachan, superintendent of schools in Brooklyn, 
who came before the Mayor as the representative of 14,000 female 
teachers in New York City and Brooklyn, to attend a public hear- 
ing of a bill which had recently passed both houses of the legisla- 
ture by overwhelming majorities, as it had already done twice 
before, to equalize the pay of the teachers in the schools of Greater 
New York. . . . 

In the first place, the bill did not ask for more pay for the 
teachers. What it demanded was "justice," namely, that the 
women teachers should be paid what the job was worth when they 
did the same work as the men. 

Now, there are some 14,000 female teachers in Greater New 
York, and some 3000 men teachers. It has been urged in some 
papers that the women are not entitled to the same pay as men 
because they are not as competent. It logically follows, therefore, 
that the great City of New York, the greatest city in the United 
States, which we consider the greatest country in the world, is 
deliberately giving its children inferior teachers, simply because 
they are cheaper, which convicts it of a crime. 

If, on the other hand, it is admitted, as it should be, that the 
women teachers are fully as competent as the men — and as I will 
assert, with many others, in the earlier stages they are far more 
competent than men — then the city is convicted of gross injustice, 
for it is convicted of paying the women for work which is as good 
as the men's less than the men, simply because they are women! 

And let us not forget that higher pay for the women means 
to induce a higher grade, a more educated, more intelligent type 
of woman to enter the school-teaching business. It needs no argu- 
ment to show that this means more for the progress of the city 
than can be accomplished by the expenditure of money in any 
other possible direction, for if a nation is finally based on the 
home, and the home is based on the individual, the training of the 



440 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

individual citizen is the very foundation of our civilization, cer- 
tainly the foundation of possible progress and evolution to higher 
and better conditions. 

The argument which is made by some that legislation from 
Albany is not the proper way to get at the issue is a quibble, for 
the reason that it is well known that no appeal to the Board of 
Estimate on behalf of the women would have had the slightest 
effect. 

And it is only because the legislature has again and again passed 
this bill and made the officials of New York realize that there is a 
great public sentiment back of it that the mayor has finally been 
forced by public opinion, evidently against his will, to appoint a 
commission to get at the facts, although in the appointment of the 
commission he evades the main issue, which is one of simple 
justice. 

It is to the credit of the trades unions that they long ago main- 
tained the principle of equal pay for equal work, and insisted, in 
every industry where they were powerful, that if the women did 
the work as well as the men, as competently as the men, as thor- 
oughly as the men, they should get the same pay as the men. 

It has been said by some that one of the reasons why women 
should accept a lower wage for the same work than men is that 
the man is generally responsible, as the head of the family, for 
many mouths, where the woman has only herself to care for. 

This, again, is a quibble, but even if true would not touch the issue 
of justice. The average woman teacher, it would be found on 
investigation, has as a rule from two to three dependent upon her. 
Either it is a widowed mother, a sick sister, a helpless father, or 
she is struggling alone to help her little brothers and sisters to an 
education and to an opening in life. 

It can be safely said that not 5 per cent, of the teachers in 
Greater New York are in a position where they can spend the 
money they earn upon themselves — and in the name of common 
sense and fair play, what is the money they get? 

Do people realize that these women teachers, who are so bound 
up with all that is best and noblest in our social life, are, in the 
great majority of cases, receiving less salary than the janitors of 
the buildings in which they do their teaching? 

The members of the musical world are interested in this fight 
by the women teachers for justice, for, as I have shown, they 
themselves suffer gravely from discrimination. And so it will be 
well for them not merely to take an interest in so far as the issue 
affects their particular profession, but whenever they can, by word, 
by deed, by vote where possible, to struggle against discrimination 
of whatever kind, wherever it is found. 

In doing this they will ultimately help themselves, and take 
their stand with those of the higher intelligence, the broader mind, 
the larger sympathies, who are struggling for humanity's uplift 



EQUAL 'PAY 'FOR 'EQUAL WORK 441 

against which all the forces of prejudice, of ignorance, of class, 
of graft and greed will ever be arrayed. — John C. Freund, Musical 
America, May 29, 1909. 



BATTLING FOR THE RIGHT 

A fight not unlike that for the standard is on in New York City 
over the question of " Equal work, equal pay." Nor is it knights 
in armor who contend. It is women on one side, backed by some 
big-minded men, with men on the other. For a long time those 
familiar with the work of schools are well aware of a fact that is 
so prominent that it strikes out all over the system and that is the 
fact that the best school work on the whole is done by women. 
This being so it is hard to understand the policy, short-sighted 
and unfair, that pays them less wages than are paid to men for an 
equal amount of the same kind of work. It takes a long time for 
social justice to catch up with what is called, for want of a better 
name, natural justice. But it does in the end. . . . 

That such a time is to come, is on the way hither, is just as cer- 
tain as sunrise and sunset. We welcome these women to the ranks 
of the republic's best friends, for those are its best friends who 
fight the battles of righteousness; and one of these battles is about 
equal wages for equal work ; and Miss Grace Strachan is its heroine 
and leader. That she is to win in the end is just as sure as justice. 
Only a little longer delay is possible. Petty men pass, poltroons, 
time or party-serving politicians pass — ^principles remain. — The 
Catholic Times, June 2, 1909. 



"EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK" 

On April 24th, twelve hundred teachers were gathered at a 
banquet given in the famous Hotel Waldorf-Astoria, in New York 
City. They were representatives, and their friends, of a local or- 
ganization of women teachers having an active membership of about 
twelve thousand, or more than twice the number of the active 
members of the National Education Association. It is probably 
the largest teachers' union in the world and owes its vitality chiefly 
to the magnificent leadership of Miss Grace C. Strachan, one of the 
district superintendents of schools in New York. 

The Interborough Association of Women Teachers — that is the 
name — was reared on the single idea of " equal pay for equal work." 
In New York City the teachers in a number of the higher gram- 
mar grades are men. Their salaries are larger than those of the 
women teaching the same grades. A woman earning advancement 
to a principalship does not receive the pay of a man occupying a 
like position, and the maximum to which she can attain is consider- 
ably less than that held out to her brothers. The Interborough 



442 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Association was formed to do away with this discrimination be- 
tween the sexes. 

An interesting discussion resulted. The opponents of the Asso- 
ciation made much of the plea that the women have only themselves 
to support, while the men .are usually heads of families, with several 
people to take care of. The question naturally suggested itself, 
why unmarried men were receiving as much as the married ones. 
Furthermore, it could be demonstrated that the burden of responsi- 
bility resting upon most of the women is quite as heavy in every 
way as that resting upon the male supporters of dependents. 

Another retort was that the men supplied a something that the 
pupils, especially the boys, were much in need of, and which women 
could not give. This something was characterized in various ways. 
Manliness is probably the best word for it. The manly example, 
the male attitude of looking at things, masculine reasoning and 
forcefulness are no doubt strong educational factors. How essential 
they are to successful elementary school work is a difficult question 
to answer. . . . 

There is another matter involved. School inspectors and super- 
intendents and other supervisors and examiners base their judg- 
ment of teachers upon results that have nothing to do with " man- 
liness." It would seem to be only just that there should be a stan- 
dard, measured by which the difference between the work of men 
and women teachers would become evident. Competition between 
the sexes could then be placed on a basis of fairness. It is just 
possible that some women teachers supply more training in " man- 
liness " than some men who receive better pay because of the as- 
sumption of the superiority of the latter. . . . — School Journal, 
(Ossian Lang), March 7, 1909. 

TEACHERS AS SUPPORTERS OF DEPENDENTS 

The arguments brought forward to promote the advancement of 
teachers' salaries must be framed with extreme caution, lest there 
be unpleasant reaction along unguarded lines. The arraignment of 
women against men, or of men against women, is an especially 
unwise procedure. There is no doubt about the reality of the jus- 
tice behind the demands for a better remuneration of the teacher's 
services. Do not let us permit this to be obscured by fruitless 
discussions about the economic value of the sexes in the market 
places of the world. 

Those women teachers of New York City who regard Miss 
Strachan as their leader have a strong claim in their insistence 
upon " equal pay for equal work." The men who are trying to 
weaken the cause of these women are bound to fail. The plea 
that the man supports a family, while the woman has only her- 
self to take care of, can easily be shown to be without real founda- 
tion in fact, besides having nothing to do with the real issue. The 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 443 

truth is, that most teachers — men and women alike — ^have not 
only themselves to take care of, but contribute also to the sup- 
port of dependent relatives. Times have changed. Arguments 
based on conditions that have passed away can be of no avail when 
the searchlight of intelligence is turned upon them. 

Men are excluded from wage-earning pursuits at an earlier age 
than they were in former days. Women have become the com- 
petitors of men in nearly all lines. Meanwhile, the number of 
dependent parents has grown to large proportions, and the care 
of them has fallen largely upon the children. To what extent the 
burden has been shifted to the lot of the daughters, I am not pre- 
pared to state. I do know that there are few women teachers 
who are free of family responsibilities which consume a portion 
of their earnings. I have heard of these few, but I have never 
met them. 

Two or three typical examples will make the point clear. 

One of the best salaried women is principal of an Eastern train- 
ing school for teachers. She receives something like $2,500 a year. 
In the fifteen years I have known her there never was a time 
when she did not carry on some university work for self-improve- 
ment and to keep abreast of the times in pedagogical sociology 
and psychology. She subscribes to the most helpful periodicals, 
and spends a portion of every vacation at a summer school. She 
dresses well, as becomes her office, and pays the ordinary taxes 
which social life exacts of cultured women. She has supported her 
widowed mother almost from the day when she began to teach, 
and has borne the expense of the education of her younger sisters. 
In her school are many poor pupils who have received substantial 
aid from her. And this is the type of the noble woman teacher of 
whom there are thousands in the common school service. 

A young woman of twenty-two became supervisor of music 
in a Western city at a salary of $900. She had drawn only one 
monthly check when her father lost his position, and in spite of 
every endeavor could find no permanent employment because of 
aged appearance and feeble health. The daughter reduced her 
personal expenses to the lowest possible point, and contributed 
the balance of her money to the support of the family. She felt 
compelled to look for a better salaried place in the East, near the 
home of her parents. The $1,100 she was paid shrank considerably 
under the increased demands the new office made upon her purse. 
She undertook evening school and vacation school work to supply 
her family with the necessities of life. The strain proved too 
much for her young life. She, too, is a type. 

A teacher in a city school receives $400 a year. A widowed 
mother and two small sisters are dependent upon her for support. 
After school hours she has private pupils. The intelligence, energy, 
pluck, and resourcefulness of this teacher would bring her twenty 
dollars a week in a commercial life. But she wants to teach. 



444 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

And so she tries to earn enough by outside work to enable her to 
stay in the common school service. The city that pays her $400 
gives the janitor of the school $1,200. But he has a wife and two 
children to support. 

Now consider that there are not a few who receive only $300 
or less a year, and these, too, have calls for financial aid. Yet, 
the teacher who is worried about the daily bread cannot possibly 
give the best strength to the work. In no other occupation is the 
drain upon the vital forces so constant. Irritability has serious 
efifects upon the developing characters of the pupils. An atmos- 
phere of cheerful serenity is the most favorable condition for 
the education of the young, and that is naturally dependent upon 
the personality of the teacher. Worry is conducive neither to 
cheerfulness nor serenity. The communities that keep their teachers 
poor are depriving their own children of a most valuable part of 
education. 

It costs money to keep in touch with the progress of the world. 
A person of cultivation has many necessary expenses that others 
manage to do without. The very office of the teacher makes cer- 
tain special demands that involve expense which are not required 
of either the bricklayer or the paperhanger. Attendance at edu- 
cational conventions is most desirable for efficiency, and that neces- 
sitates further expense. School communities do not seem to have 
these considerations in mind when fixing the salaries of teachers. 

Here is a line of arguments that tell. — The School Journal, 
Ossion Lang, Editor, September 21, 1907. 

COST 

The cost of the proposed law has been carefully estimated at 
about six million dollars, and at no hearing either before the local 
School Board or the Senate or Assemblies Cities Committee has 
a single taxpayer or tax-paying organization protested. Instead, 
the advocates of the proposed legislation are in receipt of endorse- 
ments from hundreds of thousands of voters and taxpayers, to 
say nothing of numerous organizations. — N. Y. Tribune. 

PAY THE WOMEN LIKE MEN 

The Wall Street Journal has been requested to speak favorably 
of the proposed amendment to the Davis law. This law makes the 
salaries of women employed as teachers in New York city from 
50 to 70% of those of men occupying corresponding positions. 
It is proposed by amendment to make the salaries equal. 

The Wall Street Journal cheerfully responds to this request. 
In the field of teaching women are in a true vocation, and are 
the equals of men. There can be no doubt whatever that they 
perform their duties with at least equal fidelity and ability as com- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 445 

pared with male teachers. Performing corresponding duties with 
equal fidelity and ability they should be paid the salaries paid to 
men. 

There is no other item of public expense which is more justified 
by economic results and none which gives a larger dividend of 
prosperity than education, and there is nothing that will con- 
tribute more to education than the employment of good teachers, 
women as well as men, adequately paid on a basis of equality. — ■ 
Wall Street Journal, February 25, 1907, 

THE EQUAL PAY FIGHT ONCE MORE 

Miss Grace C. Strachan is at any rate a courageous fighter. 
All sorts of dire things were threatened against her because 
she went to Albany and induced many teachers to go with her 
in order to fight for equal pay for equal work in the public 
schools without regard to sex. The Board of Education and 
the Tammany Mayor foamed and frothed about home rule, 
when they meant Tammany rule, and the Governor, accepting 
the time-worn slogan at its face value in the mouths of these 
valiant political trenchermen, although he paid no attention to 
it when his own pet Public Utilities bill knocked home rule 
higher than Gilroy's kite, finally defeated the measure. 

And they would have been still under the feet of the poli- 
ticians if the Legislature had not listened to the appeal of the 
teachers to a petition protesting against the repeal of the Davis 
bill. 

Just the same home-rule howl was raised against these most 
just and equitable measures, the latter of which is not unfitly 
spoken of as the Magna Charta of the Public Schools, but it 
did not avail, because its utter insincerity was then clearly 
understood in the Executive Chamber at Albany. And it was 
fully as insincere when it was raised this year against the equal 
pay for equal work bill. 

At least the women teachers are without redress in that di- 
rection, however the case may stand against the male teachers. 
These latter are now alarmed about the Davis bill, a measure 
they never could have succeeded in passing without the aid of 
the women teachers. The home-rule cry, in whooping up which 
they so vigorously joined last year in order to defeat the equal 
pay for equal work bill, is being started again, this time with 
the design of repealing the Davis bill, so that the teachers of 
both sexes may be once more under control of Tammany. 

To ward oft' the impending blow, the very male teachers who 
v/orked so bitterly against the equal pay for equal work bill of 
last year are now trying to get the signatures of the women 
teachers to a petition protesting against the repeal of the Davis 
bill 



446 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Miss Strachan meets the men teachers in militant style. 

Remembering the warfare they conducted against the women 
teachers last winter at Albany, she issued a statement yesterday 
addressed to the women teachers, in which she says, among 
other things: 

" You know that many of the very men who are seeking your 
signatures did all in their power to prevent our success last 
year, even being guilty of threats of unjust treatment of their 
subordinates and of misrepresentation of facts. Why, then, 
should you concern yourselves over the advisability of signing 
papers sent around by any association other than the Inter- 
borough Association of Women Teachers, the largest and 
strongest association of teachers in the world?" 

Here is no note of surrender, but a courageous defiance not 
only of their opponents of last year among the men teachers 
and principals, but of the politicians and others behind them 
who think, or pretend to think, a woman is not entitled to as 
much pay as a man for doing precisely the same kind of work. 
However, the leader of the women teachers adds that if they 
desire to sign the petition for the retention of the D'avis bill 
they should do so only when a clause is added making pro- 
vision for an amendment giving equal pay for equal work with- 
out regard to sex. Following a great historical example, the 
women are evidently going to fight it out on that line if it 
takes all summer. — The Standard-Union, Brooklyn, Saturday Even- 
ing, December 14, 1907. 

Author's Note — The Tammany leaders have favored the 
women teachers' bills and all the Tammany members of the 
Legislature have voted for them, with the exception of one 
Bronx Assemblyman, who was defeated for re-election, No- 
vember, 1909. 

Miss Grace Strachan makes it plain that what the women 
teachers are fighting for is not more salary, but equal pay for 
equal work. Three million dollars a year increase voted by 
the Board of Education two years ago, but refused hy the 
Board of Estimate, was not what the members of Miss Strach- 
an's organization asked for, nor does $6,000,000 a year pro- 
posed now meet the principle for which they are striving. It 
is not a question of more or less money, but of the mainte- 
nance or abolition of a discrimination expressly based upon 
sex and nowhere expressly based upon qualifications. — Brook- 
lyn Standard-Union, July 16, 1909. 

ON THE FEMALE TEACHERS' MOVEMENT 

Last Thursday night there was a mass meeting of women 
teachers at Cooper Union in the interest of the equalization of 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 447 

salaries. The opponents of that idea were also out in force and 
distributed circulars, part of which read as follows: 

" When a woman not charged with a home, not contributing 
to the family life of the nation, enters the industrial field, she 
is entitled to compensation as an individual only. She is not 
entitled to the same pay as the man whose just wage is the 
family wage." 

We doubt if there was a better argument presented by the 
female teachers themselves than in this extract from the objec- 
tions of their opponents. The circular quoted speaks of Jhe 
"just" wage of the man of family, but there is really no wage 
to-day that is based upon the necessary support of a famil}-. 
And it is for this very reason that the wage of the man no 
longer suffices to keep the family that women have been forced 
to seek employment in industry and in the professions. In 
fact, the only wage known to-day is the individvial wage, and 
that wage is regulated by the competition between the individ- 
uals, male and female, of the one family, aye, even the children 
of the family enter into the competition. 

No more than cattle are paid for in the "Cattle Market" at 
the " family price " of the bull, are wage earners, among whom 
teachers take their place, paid for in the " Labor Market " at 
the family price of the male. 

Woman, until the growth of the factory system, was nothing 
more nor less than a domestic servant, part of whose household 
duties consisted in spinning, weaving, making clothes, etc., etc. 
Woman was a producer, though mainly for the consumption of 
her own family, and when the household production .developed 
into factory production she had to follow it to the factory, just 
as the handicraft man had to abandon his little shop and follow 
the developed tool into the factory. 

In domestic servitude in the family woman received no 
"pay," in the present day sense, she shared in the general 
product. And now that she has " freedom " to work, the ex- 
ploiters bargain to hold her to the no-cash basis that was a 
feature of her domestic servitude. 

So real a fact is it that individual production, and not pro- 
duction by the head of the family, has become the order of 
the day that where women do not go out and work you find 
them bringing work home, or taking lodgers or boarders, in 
order to hold up their individual end of the family production. 

We are glad to see the women school teachers organizing in 
an effort to better their condition. What is needed among 
women is a keener sense of solidarity. They are yet suffering 
from the long heritage of isolation endured by their mothers. 
All the real advantages that exploited woman may gain will 
only be secured by joining hands with her exploited brother 
man and wrenching such advantages from the exploiting class 



448 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

' — be they Boards of Education or Boards of Directors of cor- 
porations. — Weekly People, New York City, February 8, 1908. 

Mayor McClellan is right. He says he vetoed the women 
teachers' bill because it was his " sacred duty to do so." So 
it was. A Democratic or a Republican official is a personage 
who directly and indirectly has pledged his sacred word to 
safeguard the interests of the capitalist class. The capitalist 
class is the taxpayer. The taxes it pays come, it is true, from 
wealth produced by the proletariat, but it is a wealth that the 
proletariat is plundered of in the shop. It follows that the 
higher the taxes all the more has the capitalist class to dis- 
gorge in the shape of taxes The equalization of salaries bill 
amounted to higher taxation. The sacredly pledged Mayor 
vetoed the bill. True McClellan! AH credit to our God-fearing 
Mayor! — People, New York City, May 29, 1909. 

THE TEACHERS' SALARIES 

A month's study of the problem of equal pay for teachers in 
the public schools has sufficed only to convince Mayor McClel- 
lan's commission that a deliberate investigation of the whole 
subject must be made if any satisfactory result is to be obtained. 
So extensive is the field and so complex the factors that noth- 
ing but a superficial survey was possible in the time at com- 
mand. That glaring inequalities exist the commission had no 
difficulty in finding out. The further the matter was probed 
the more apparent became the need of something like a com- 
plete reconstruction of the entire system of compensation. 
Simple justice and the city's best interests alike demand that 
every man and woman employed in training our children shall 
be fairly treated, and that arbitrary distinctions, the outgrowth 
of custom, shall be abolished. 

But discernment of the absurdities and injustice of the pre- 
vailing system is one thing — a thing of which any reasonable 
person of ordinarj'^ intelligence is capable — and discovery of a 
practicable means for removing these obstacles to rational ad- 
ministration is quite another. The mayor's commission, recog- 
nizing this difficulty, has contented itself with putting forwards, 
merely tentatively, various alternative plans. No recommen- 
dation accompanies them. Admittedly none of them goes to 
the heart of the matter. They serve rather to make clear the 
difficulties in the way of arriving at a thorough solution. What 
is required if this object is to be achieved is a painstaking in- 
quiry by a body of candid and competent investigators, which 
should include women as well as men, who will give the time 
necessary to get all the facts upon which to base a sound judg- 
ment. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 449 

This duty devolves upon the incoming administration, and 
the sooner it is undertaken the better for the good name and 
the welfare of the city. — The Globe, December 29, 1909. 

WOMEN SHOULD RECEIVE THE SAME PAY AS MEN 
IF THEY DO THE SAME WORK 

The resolution now before the Board of Education, provid- 
ing that women teachers shall be paid the same salaries as 
men teachers when they do the same work, should not be held 
up very long. It should be passed without any debate. Equal 
pay for equal work is sound common sense, and unequal pay 
for doing the same thing is unfair and absurd on the face 
of it. If a man receive $2,000 a year for teaching arithmetic 
to a room full of boys and he throws up his job and a woman 
is put in his place and does the same work as he does, and 
just as well, why should she receive $1,200 a year? It is not 
only an injustice to the women teachers, but it comes close 
to being an affront, inasmuch as the board members say in 
effect that they do not believe that women do the work as well 
as men do — while we and all the world know that in the public 
schools, especially those attended by the youngest children, 
women teachers are the more capable and patient and con- 
scientious. — Telegraph, Dec. 25, 1909. 

EQUALIZING THE SALARY OF MALE AND FEMALE 
TEACHERS 

If a male teacher receives $1,200 a year it is presumable that 
his service is worth that sum. If a female teacher receives 
for the same amount and quality of work $1,000, that reduction 
amounts to taxing her $200 for being a woman, and is neither 
equity nor chivalry. — Madison Square Presbyterian Church, 
Rev. C. H. Parkhurst, Pastor, May 19, 1907. 

TEACHERS' SALARIES 

All over the country questions affecting public schools are 
alive and stirring. Among these questions those which con- 
cern salaries for teachers have, in a number of cities, for sev- 
eral years been especially acute. The Legislature of New York 
is now considering a bill to equalize the payment of men and 
women teachers for equal pay. At present a man may receive 
a higher salary than a woman who is his official superior and 
the supervisor of his work. A woman as principal of a school 
may receive less than a man may receive among the youngest 
children in the very lowest grade, where, by the way, he ought 
not to be allowed at all, and where he is put usually only for 



450 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

incompetence in the upper grades. Such flagrant injustice in 
the long run is flagrantly bad economy, for nothing is more im- 
portant to all the people than that the schools should have 
the best teachers who can be secured, whether men or women. 
Those who object to equality talk about the way the money 
is spent, the men usually being married and the women not, 
but such a paternal ground for fixing salaries hardly requires 
an answer A deeper argument is that, in a region like New 
York, if money is spent in raising salaries it will not be spent 
on sorely needed buildings and increase of teaching force. This 
objection may be valid for the moment, but only for the mo- 
ment. It does not touch the final principle, and the just prin- 
ciple should be in some way recognized and established, even 
if the full effect must be unfortunately postponed. — Collier's, 
February 22, 1908. 

THE SCHOOLMARM 

New York's 12,000 women teachers have no votes, and there- 
in doubtless they are " inferior " to the 200Q, men teachers. 
Therein, doubtless, lies a part of their inability to get equal 
pay for equal work from the Board of Education, and the 
manifest difficulty of their cause before the legislature. Their 
appeal is to the generosity and justice of the city, not to any- 
body's political interest. 

The people should realize the injustice of the presumption 
which underlies a system that starts a woman teacher in at 
$600 and a man teacher at $900, and raises the woman's pay 
$40 a year and the man's pay $105. It is assumed that the wo- 
man teacher is a bird of passage — a schoolmarm one day and 
a blushing bride the next, while the man teacher will be on the 
job for life. But it is very much the other way. Many women 
are electing school teaching as a permanent vocation. Most 
of the veteran teachers whose former pupils gather from time 
to time to do them honor are women. 

Men make teaching a crutch at least as much as women do. 
They pursue their studies for the law and other professions, 
and meanwhile boil the pot by teaching. The initial inequality 
between the pay of men and women is deepened by the fact 
that many day teachers also teach in the night schools. With 
less endurance than men, and under a social scruple or danger 
that makes it unwise for them to undertake a night school in 
some parts of the city, women have this additional means of 
livelihood largely withdrawn from them. 

While the compensation of all other classes of city employees 
is being raised, the woman teacher, who belongs to no political 
club, whose guiding principles are efficiency and the devoted 
care of her charges rather than influence, is passed by. She 
is ground between the upper and nether millstone of an in- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 451 

equitable and insufficient salary and the increased cost of liv- 
ing. Give the schoolmarm a square deal! As the chosen 
guardian of the rising generation she has a better title to it 
than anyone else. — The Evening Mail, Thursday, March 7, 1907. 

The dinner of the school teachers last Saturday night was a 
most enlightening affair. It ought to have taught the few men 
present that the women are filling a place in the concerns of 
this country, little dreamt of a few years ago. When the Civil 
War called the men of the North to battle there were not men 
enough to do the work at home. Every industry languished 
for the lack of men, and women were called upon to take their 
places. The call was promptly heeded, and women appeared 
laboring in places where no man ever thought to see them. 
They were joyfully welcomed, and by their conduct, their thrift, 
and their competence, won from the American man that degree 
of homage that has set him above all of the men of other na- 
tions; in his respect for women. And the most important work 
done by women at that time was in public schools. Did they 
do their work well or ill? Incompetence cannot thrive. The 
spirit of humanity will not submit to costly and worthless ex- 
periments. If the women had not proved themselves capable 
of teaching children they would long ago have disappeared 
from the public schools. But instead of disappearing they have 
waxed in numbers and in usefulness. — Democracy, May i, igog. 

At a meeting of the Men Teachers and Principals' Associa- 
tion held a week ago, Profesor Shumway made an effort to 
show that women teachers should not receive as much pay as 
inen teachers for the same kind of work. He made these 
points: 

"Wages must be just to employer and employee; that wage 
is just when sufficient to hold efficient labor; that it should be 
big enough to give the worker a living wage; that the neces- 
sary masculine wage is an unnecessary feminine wage; that it 
would be unjust to women to give them enough pay to make 
their places of value to men, for then they would be driven out 
of the schools; that if women succeed in driving out the men 
then they would have no call to raise a cry for the equalizing of 
pay and that this would work to their harm." 

It seems to us that the professor has entirely missed any 
good reason for refusing women the same pay as that given to 
men for the same kind of work. It is certain that women are 
as necessary in our schools as the men. They depend upon 
each other. Without the women there could be no proper 
basis for the men to work upon. It would be like trying to 
build a house upon the shifting sand. Men cannot drive wo- 



452 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

men out of the schools and women cannot drive the men out. 
The women have won their places in our educational system 
by hard, honest and competent work. The question of a living 
wage doesn't enter into the matter at all, if the professor will 
excuse us for saying so. There is no sentiment in business, and 
any corporation, municipal or otherwise, that seeks to do busi- 
ness on a sentimental basis will soon have a receiver in charge 
of his affairs. 

What is the market price of labor? That is the onlj' ques- 
tion. In the matter of public teaching the market price of 
teachers is fixed by the public. It has no variable quantity be- 
cause it depends upon a monopoly. Then the question comes: 
What is the value of this labor to the corporation? In this 
case the corporation is the people of the state; and the people, 
represented in Senate and Assembly, have declared that the 
labor performed by the women is worth as much as the same 
kind of labor performed by the men. Wherefore this is the 
market price of this kind of labor and the women should bene- 
fit by this decision. 

There are men in this country getting one hundred thousand 
dollars a year. Is this a living wage? Of course it is much 
more than any man needs to live upon, but he gets it because 
that is the market price. There are men getting seven dollars 
a week. Is this a living wage? No. Yet it is the market 
price. Who has set the market price? The consumer. And so 
the consumer in the matter of the women school teachers, or 
in other words the people, say that she ought to get the same 
pay as men. Then the professor says that if men be driven out 
of the public schools the women could not get more pay be- 
cause then she could not raise the cry of equal pay. How can 
men be driven out because women have their pay raised? This 
statement is interesting only because it hasn't any foundation 
to support it. It is a phenomenon. 

Being of the male species ourselves we do not want to think 
that there is any man whose livelihood depends upon the work 
of under-paid women. And so, with all courtesy to the pfo- 
fessor, we are constrained to believe that he is wholly mis- 
taken in the view he takes and we desire to assure him that 
the women school teachers will be receiving the same pay as 
men for the same kind of work before he or we are eighteen 
months older. — Democracy, May 29, 1909. 

It is only reasonable to assume that the women school teach- 
ers have won their fight for equal pay. The battle has been 
fought with much honor and courage on the part of the wo- 
men and with much sycophancy, dodging, and insincerity on the 
part of the men who have opposed their claim for fair treat- 
ment. It is an axiom to say that in the end right will prevail, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 453 

but right very often has a mighty hard fight of it before it 
does prevail. Wrong is often strong and many fisted, and it 
is often aided by a line of persons, some thick-witted, some 
stubborn, some wicked, some blind, who battle against the 
right. There is never much difficulty in convincing the clear- 
eyed and clear-brained of the right, but when it comes to teach- 
ing the stupid, to win over the stubborn, to beat the wicked 
and to open the eyes of the blind, then real difficulties are met. 
If the women school teachers had a weaker cause, less courage, 
less courtesy, and less character, they would have despaired 
and future generations of teachers would have suffered. But 
they had every one of the qualities that make for success, and 
so, naturally, they succeed. The beginning of the year 1910 
is the beginning of a new era for them. It will see the women 
school teachers getting the same pay as the men teachers for 
the same kind of work; it will see the women school teachers 
growing in numbers and efficiency; it will see a marked im- 
provement in the public school system, and it will see a big 
advance toward the uplifting of the poor. The fact that the 
women school teachers have had to fight for so many years 
for justice that would involve an additional expenditure of 
less than six million dollars a year, while many men in public 
life engaged in public work directly and indirectly, become 
millionaires in a few years, has always seemed to us to be an 
alarming symptom. The work the women school teachers 
do is the most important work done by any of the public em- 
ployees. Their work is not only for to-day but for all time. 
Its efifect will be seen when every person living now will have 
passed away. It is work that will advance the nation in all 
of the sciences and arts, and in the deeper things, such as love 
of country, honesty, good living, and general knowledge. The 
meeting of the teachers last night was a good indication of 
the appreciation the people have of their work. — Democracy, Dec. 
18, 1909. 

"JOURNAL" EDITORIALS 

SALARIES OF WOMEN THAT TEACH IN PUBLIC 
SCHOOLS 

What Excuse Is There For Underpaying Them? 
The Legislature Should Repair the Injustice! 

Women that teach in New York's public schools are trying 
to get from the Legislature of the State, decent, fair treat- 
ment, and they ought to get it. 

In the schools the first thing to be thought of is the children. 

If children taught by women are not well taught, if the wo- 



454 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

men's work is not as well done as in classes governed by men, 
then the women should be replaced by men. 

The difficulty in getting fair treatment, common everyday 
justice, for the women teachers illustrates the general un- 
willingness of human beings to accept a plain truth. 

A few centuries ago everybody thought it was right for one 
human being to own another, no matter what his color. 

Fifty years ago in this country we thought it was right for 
one human being to own another, provided the slave had a 
black skin, or a black ancestor that made his skin yellow. 

It seemed then proper that one man with a white skin shovdd 
be paid for his work properly, and another man with a black 
skin paid nothing at all — unless with a whip. 

That idea we have dropped. A long war, which cost millions 
of lives and thousands of millions of dollars, drummed into 
American skulls the truth that it doesn't pay to keep slaves, 
and that it isn't right. 

If white men and black men do the same kind of work now, 
we give them the same kind of pay. 

It is too bad we haven't sense of justice enough to do the 
same thing for women. 

Nobody would dream of saying in this country, " I'll pay an 
Irishman nine cents, and a German eight cents for the same 
kind of work." It would seem ridiculous. 

Then why pay a male human being two dollars and a female 
human being one dollar for identical work? 

If men can do the school work better than the women, then 
men only should be employed, in justice to the children. 

And if the women can do the work as well as the men, and 
they can, unless it be in the management of the very biggest 
and roughest boys, then the women should be paid as well as 
the men. — New York Evening Journal (Editorial). 

SENSELESS OPPOSITION TO THE TEACHERS' 
SALARY BILL 

That the White bill, giving equal pay for equal work to New 
York teachers, is to be smothered in the Assembly was a 
statement made and applauded at the meeting of men 
teachers held at Terrace Garden Saturday. The cheering of 
such an announcement is incomprehensible to the average man, 
but, for the matter of that, so is the opposition to the meas- 
ure. To the ordinary chivalrous, fair-minded American, the 
chief principle embodied in the White bill is one of simple 
justice, and the fight made on it is so out of keeping with the 
spirit of to-day that it has in it an element of barbarism. 

Is compensation given for sex or for service rendered? If 
a certain piece of work is worth a certain amount of money, 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 455 

does it matter whether the one who does the work is 
a man or a woman? In buying a bushel of wheat or a loaf 
of bread, do we stop to inquire as to the sex of the farmer or 
baker? If any distinction is made, chivalry would suggest 
that the woman should be favored. To discriminate against 
her simply because she is a woman is not only unfair, but un- 
manly. 

There was one gratifying note at the Terrace Garden 
meeting. It was the promise implied, if not stated, by mem- 
bers of the board, that if the White bill is killed there will be 
an advance of salaries all along the line. Promises are good, 
even if given only in hints and not in open, manlike state- 
ments. The salaries of teachers certainly should be advanced, 
and radically. Yet the majority of people would prefer legal 
enactments to that effect rather than vague intimations from 
a body that has had power to make such an increase for years, 
but has shown little desire to take such action until a fight 
is on to prevent women from receiving plain justice. 

If there are defects in the White bill they are easily cured 
by amendment. The main idea is of enough worth that it 
should not be lost because of minor details. For this principle 
of equal pay for equal work the campaign should be waged 
until its success is assured. — Journal, 1907. 

THE EFFORT TO GET FAIR TREATMENT FOR 
WOMEN SCHOOL TEACHERS 

It Is Honorable, Necessary. It Should Be Persisted In 

Last year a determined effort was made by women v/ho teach 
in New York City's public schools to obtain fair treatment 
from the Legislature. Their demand was that a woman able 
to do as good work as a man should for the same work re- 
ceive the same pay as the man. This newspaper endeavored 
to assist the teachers, and the Legislature decided in their 
favor. Governor Hughes, however, decided against the teach- 
ers. 

Now a set of imposing resolutions has been adopted by the 
Board of Education censuring the teachers for their activity, 
which is called pernicious. An especial attack is made upon 
Miss Grace C. Strachan, District Superintendent of New York 
City. 

The Board of Education is much grieved because it thinks 
that some of the women have been neglecting their duty. 

On behalf of the teachers we wish to tell the Board of Edu- 
cation that the teachers that went to Albany were working 
in the best interests of the children, of all the people, as well 
as of the teachers themselves. 



456 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

As for the attack on Miss Strachan personall}', that is pecul- 
iarly uncalled for. 

Miss Strachan did spend thirty-four days in hard work try- 
ing to get justice for the teachers. 

And Miss Strachan couldn't possibly have made a cent by 
the passage of the law for which she worked. 

Miss Strachan as district superintendent was not included 
in those that would have been benefited by the law. She was 
working simply from a sense of duty to help other teachers, 
and to help the city. 

In addition, Miss Strachan reported every day's absence 
from duty, she worked overtime and at night to make up for 
such absence, and she was engaged, as she herself truly said 
in her report to the board, " in a cause destined to uplift the 
moral standards of the school system, and hence of the com- 
munity, the State, the nation, and the world — the establishment 
of justice for the women workers in our public schools." 

We should like to ask the members of the Board of Edu- 
tion who condemn Miss Strachan and the other teachers how 
many of them ever worked hard for thirty-four days to help 
other people; how many of them ever took the trouble to go 
to Albany day after day, when they couldn't possibly make a 
cent by doing that, and when all the satisfaction they could 
get was in knowing that they had done their duty? 

NOT ONLY EQUAL PAY BUT DECENT PAY 
TO TEACHERS 

Not only the vv^omen teachers of New York, but the schools 
are entitled to congratulations on the first victory for the 
principle of equal pay for equal work. The fact that there was 
but one vote in the State Senate against the bill giving women 
the same salaries as men teachers, and that this one vote was 
not dictated by opposition to the main feature of the measure, 
but to a minor proposition, not only reflects credit on the 
Senate, but makes it certain that the bill will become a law. 
This is good as far it goes, but the principle should be ex- 
tended to all other women in the employ of the city. Salary 
should be determined by the character of the position and not 
by the sex of the occupant. Discrimination does not cease to 
be discrimination because practised against a woman or against 
all women. Plain and simple justice is not a matter of sex 
distinction. — Journal. 

WHY THE CITY IS TOO POOR TO PAY THE 
TEACHERS FAIRLY 

The school teachers of this city, motoriously underpaid, asked 
the Legislature for salaries more nearly commensurate with 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 457 

their valuable services. The Legislature granted their request. 
The Governor vetoed the bill. 

The teachers next applied to the Board of Education, which 
had promised to " do something." 

Recently a member of that Board named Jonas had this to 
say: 

" We should not allow a single increase of salary. The con- 
dition of the city's finances does not warrant it. The Board 
of Estimate is not only responsible, but it will be called to 
account if a single increase of salary is allowed." 

Exactly. The Board of Estimate is in constant terror lest 
it be called to account for allowing an advance of teachers' 
salaries. 

Yet it summons abundant fortitude when it wants to buy 
a theatre for $230,000 and sell it back to the same crowd for 
$11,500. It has plenty of courage when raising the salaries of 
worthless appointees of McClellan. It is calm and untroubled 
when passing Bridge terminal deals or a thousand and one 
other operations by which the municipal treasury is almost daily 
looted. 

The condition of the city's finances does not warrant giving 
fair pay to school teachers, upon whom rests the gravest and 
highest responsibility for the future of this country. 

Yet it seems to warrant every sort of extravagance an ex- 
travagant and incompetent administration can indulge in. 

Even at a time when the credit of the city is stretched till 
it cracks', the condition of its finances apparently warrants 
throwing away $2,000,000 by awarding the contract for the 
Ashokan dam to the highest bidder when the lowest bidder is 
a man of proven responsibility and experience. 

The present administration has made many promises about 
what it was going to do for the schools. 

In practice it has denied the teachers decent pay, deprived 
thousands of children of the privilege of going to school at 
all, and done absolutely nothing adequately to increase either 
the capacity or the efficiency of the city's educational system. 

This is a matter that appeals directly to every parent, as it 
should to every citizen. 

Upon the school children of to-day depends the welfare of 
the city to-morrow. 

Do you who pay taxes prefer to have your money spent in 
fair salaries for the women who educate your children or in 
real estate deals which enrich a few grafting politicians? 

Do you think that a Board of Estimate which can smugly 
defend the Montauk Theatre deal would actually have any- 
thing to fear from public opinion if it permitted the Board of 
Education to make the schools of New York worthy of the 
greatest city in the world? — Journal, August, 1907. 



458 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



ONE TRIUM^PH FOR "EQUAL PAY" 

The City of Buffalo is to be congratulated upon possessing 
the sense of justice and decency to establish the principle of 
" equal pay for equal work," which has been denied the women 
teachers of the City of New York. It is only a question of 
time when American fairness and chivalry will force the adop- 
tion of this measure everywhere. When that time arrives it 
will be no slight gratification to the citizens of Buffalo that 
they were among the pioneers in the work, just as it will be a 
like source of regret to the people of Greater New York that 
they permitted the second city in the State to get ahead of 
them in bringing about this inevitable reform. 

The case is even worse with the metropolis, for not only 
did its city government throw every possible obstacle in the 
way of the Equal Pay bill, but refused a three-million-dollar 
appropriation for a general advance of teachers' salaries. There 
was plenty of money to add a salary grab of $116,000 in the 
Comptroller's office, and for even greater extravagance and 
graft in other departments, but not a cent to furnish a decent 
wage for those who educate the young. The women teachers 
cannot vote and are not a part of the political machine. There- 
fore they receive scant consideration or courtesy from the 
present "Mayor" of this city and his associates. 

The pluck and courage shown by the Interborough Associa- 
tion of Women Teachers, in the face of rebuffs received from 
the Governor, the " Mayor " and the Comptroller, will arouse 
imiversal admiration, at least in all except the three gentle- 
men named. Not only do the members refuse to recede from 
their demands, but they propose to repeat the fight by which 
they won the Legislature last year. It is not exactly compli- 
mentary to modern ideas of chivalry that men leave them to 
make this fight for plain justice. — New York Journal, December 
7, 1907- 



PAY TEACHERS ACCORDING TO THEIR VALUE 

They Are the Most Useful of Public Servants, and It Is Not 
Only Stupid but Infamous to Deny Them Justice 

Copyright, 1909, by " American-Journal-Examiner." 

There is no more important duty in America than that per- 
formed by the teachers in the public schools — the manufactur- 
ing of good American citizens out of the raw material of good 
American boys. 

The future of the republic depends on the success of the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 459 

teachers. To interfere with that success by parsimony is noth- 
ing short of criminal. 

The Mayor of New York now has under advisement the 
Equal Pay bill, which provides that the women in the schools 
of this city shall receive the same pay as men engaged in the 
same work. 

To veto such a bill would be to give notice to parents that 
the education of their children is considered of small impor- 
tance by a public servant who is taking their money on the 
pretense of looking after their interests. 

The Legislature has passed the bill. If vetoed by the Mayor 
it cannot be re-enacted for another year. In the meantime 
the outrageous injustice to the women teachers will continue — • 
the shame of grossly underpaying the most useful of all public 
servants will remain with New York City. 

It is the duty of the teacher to insure the future greatness 
of this country by turning out young men and young women 
who are able enough, and honest enough, and patriotic enough 
to be first-class citizens. 

For the larger part of every week day the future citizens are 
in their hands, to be made or marred, according to the ability 
and earnestness of the teachers. 

Originally parents educated their own children, giving the 
best that was in them to make the new generation wiser and 
better than the old. 

It has now become necessary to delegate this work to others. 

But it remains the greatest work of civilization — more im- 
portant than any other art or profession — infinitely more useful 
to the republic than the labors of the doctor, who treats 
phj'sical ailments, or of the judge, who is called in to settle 
the differences of opinion that arise between citizen and citizen. 

We pay our judges big salaries, and vast veneration, and use 
them mostly to decide dispvites — chiefly in matters of money. 

We pay our teachers very small salaries, and use them, nine 
months in the year, to shape the whole course of human prog- 
ress, through their direction of the minds of those who are 
to make human progress. 

The shame of that is enough, as all fair-minded people will 
admit. The machinist, called in to tinker a refractory motor 
under an automobile, is paid better than the instructor who 
cares for the mind, and, incidentally, the soul of a growing 
human child. 

As further proof of callousness to the even-handed justice 
that figures so often in public oratory and so seldom anywhere 
else, we pay men teachers far better than women teachers for 
identically the same work. 

Usually the women do their work better. They have more 
sympathy, more undestanding of child nature, less aptitude to 



46o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

become swollen with importance because they know how to 
read and to spell a little better than their pupils. 

The idea of public schools, free to the children of rich and 
poor, was the idea that made the United States a great nation. 
American schools are good — better than those of any other 
country. 

But they can be made better still. The public schools should, 
in fact, be made so good that no parent, however rich could 
afiford to send his children to a private school. 

School superintendents should be men of as much ability and 
fitness for their positions as railroad superintendents, and 
should receive better pay. 

School teachers should be the best paid class of public serv- 
ants, as well as the most efficient. 

And the fact that the work that they have been doing has 
been under-valued and under-rewarded for so long is all the 
more reason that it should be recognized and adequately paid 
now. 

It will be time to talk economy when some legislature passes 
a bill to stop waste of public money on condemnation jobs, 
the gift of valuable franchises to greedy corporations, the 
purchase of rotten equipment for the Fire Department. 

Economy aimed at impairing the efficiency of the public 
schools is no economy at all, but sheer criminal folly. 

Naturally the teachers are interested in the bill. They have 
a right not to beg for justice, but demand it. 

But important as is this measure to the teachers, it is far 
more important to every citizen. To the teacher it means only 
a fair return for their brains and time. To the citizen it means 
raising the schools toward the level on which they belong, and 
declaring publicly that the people of New York care as much 
for its future citizenship as they do for the future of the corpo- 
rations that are seeking to grab its streets. — New York Evening 
Journal, May 13, 1909. 



WRITTEN FOR THE EVENING JOURNAL DEC 8, 1909 

By Dr. C, H. Parkhurst 

Copyright, 1909, by the N. Y. Evening Journal Pub. Co. 

The women teachers in our public schools are again ex- 
ploiting the question of equal pay for equality (in quantity and 
quality) of service. This is to some extent a part of the great 
question that is now being agitated by her sex, and in part it 
is a question by itself. 

Assuming that a piece of work done by a woman, whether 
in school or anywhere else, is the exact equivalent, ia every 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 461 

respect, of the same piece of work done by a man, it is diffi- 
cult to see the abstract justice of discriminating between the 
two in the matter of compensation. 

THE ONLY QUESTION IS WHETHER THEIR DEMAND IS JUST 

If, for example, a man receives fifteen hundred dollars per 
annum for a given amount of instruction and of a given quality, 
and a woman receives fourteen hundred for its exact duplicate, 
in amount and quality, either he receives more than his services 
are worth or she receives less than they are worth; and if she 
receives less than they are worth she is by so much defrauded. 
It appears impossible to discover means by which any different 
conclusion can be arrived at. 

It is not a question whether it would cost six million dollars 
more per annum, or twelve million, to meet the demand of the 
women teachers. The only question is whether their demand 
is a just one. If the people of the city at large understand 
the ins and outs of the problem, they will not willingly be 
partners to any dealing with these women that is not a just 
dealing. 

If a given teacher's service is worth fifteen hundred dollars, 
the disposition of the town, whatever the disposition of the 
Board of Education, will be to pay it, and not to scale down 
her compensation 011 the ground of her sex. Saying nothing 
about the ungallantry of it, it is inequitable. 

EVERY PERSON, EVERY SERVICE, EVERY THING HAS ITS VALUE 

Every person, every service, every thing, in fact, has its 
value. It may not always be easy to determine exactly what 
that value is, but, once determined, a consistent price should 
be put upon it. Granted that that is not the principle upoa 
which compensations are ordinarily determined, custom is no 
excuse for injustice. 

Out in Pasadena people pay for their electricity three cents 
for each kilowatt hour, and the manager of the system says: 
" We can make money at this figure, pay interest on the 
bonds, and establish a sinking fund." 

The New York Edison Company charge ten cents for the 
same service. They charge it because they can get it, not be- 
cause it is worth it. That is the way things generally go; but 
because it is usual for us to get all we can for what we sell, 
and to pay as little as we can for what we buy, does not 
justify either the seller or tTie buyer. 

If the city is so poor as to be unable to pay these women 
teachers all they are worth, that is one thing, and under those 
circumstances the fair course to pursue will be to scale down 



462 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the salary of the male teachers a little and scale up that of the 
women to meet it. 

But if the town has the needed funds at command, as it un- 
doubtedly has, and if the demand of the women is just, as it 
is claimed to be, then all they have got to do is to continue 
to stand squarely on the justice of that demand and eventually 
it will be conceded to them, and the more gentle and refined 
the persistency with which they press their claim the sooner 
the concession will be made. There are, however, two very 
delicate questions involved, and which require to be settled 
in advance. 

The first is whether the women teachers are not already re- 
ceiving all that their services are worth. It seems a little 
ungracious to raise that inquiry, but it is being raised, and 
that, too, by people whose judgment is to be respected. Their 
sense of justice would certainly (?) make them as unwilling 
to receive more than they earn as to receive less. 

INCREASED SALARIES WILL ATTRACT BETTER TEACHERS 

The second question is really included in the first, and is 
this — whether, taking the whole year through, there is not that 
feature of their physical constitution that positively prohibits 
that uninterrupted solidity of service possible to be rendered 
by the male. 

These two questions are propounded only for the purpose of 
not leaving out of the investigation anything that is suitable 
to be included in it. 

There is one further point that has perhaps not suggested 
itself to the teachers who are demanding an increase of salary, 
which is this: That if their compensation is increased, that 
increase will attract to the service a class of teachers cor- 
respondingly more competent than those that are employed 
here at present, so that if the claim that is now urged is con- 
ceded, the least qualified of those now upon the force will nat- 
urally find themselves supplanted, and instead of obtaining an 
addition to their salary, will lose all that they now have. 

C. H. PARKHURST. 

DR. PARKHURST AND THE EQUAL PAY QUESTION 

Miss Strachan, President of the Interboro Teachers' Associa- 
tion, Replies to the Article by Dr. Parkhurst Published in the 
Last Column of This Paper. 

Copyright, 1909, by the N. Y. Evening Journal Pub. Co. 

Dr. Parkhurst writes to-day on the question as to equal pay 
for women teachers. The Evening Journal believes that the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 463 

city should set an example in common justice and honesty and 
pay the women for equal service as the men are paid. This 
will be better for the women and better for the men as well, 
although some of the men do not know it. We publish Dr. 
Parkhurst's extremely thoughtful and judicial article and pre- 
sent here the view of the women teachers presented by Miss 
Strachan: 

BY MISS GRACE C. STRACHAN 

Dr. Parkhurst in his article raises only two points that can 
be discussed as having any bearing on the question of whether 
or not women teaching in our public schools should receive 
equal pay with the men teachers. 

In regard to the question of the women teachers being over- 
paid, I want to say that in order to be a teacher nowadays 
one first must have been graduated from a four years' course 
in a high school, and after having taken a two years' course 
in a training school for teachers, must have passed a very 
difficult examination for a license. 

These requirements have raised the average age of the 
teacher at the beginning of her service to twenty-one years. 
The day has entirely gone when girls could begin to teach in 
the public schools of our city at the ages of fourteen, fifteen 
and sixteen. Yet our teachers receive the munificent salary 
in the first year of $600. This amount is increased annually, 
if the teacher stands well in the various examinations, by $40 
a year for sixteen years. At this rate a woman is thirty- 
eight years of age, who, continuing to teach in the public 
schools, receives $1,240 a year. 

I believe that a study of the City Record for June last will 
show that women telephone operators employed by the city 
received as much as $1,300 a year, and that women stenographers 
received salaries ranging from $600 to $2,400 a year, the majority 
of them receiving from $1,200 to $1,500. 

In order to obtain these positions, these girls have to fulfill 
no other requirement than the Civil Service age requirement 
of at least eighteen years, and a simple educational test. They 
may never have attended school beyond the fifth year of our 
elementary course. 

Even the matrons in the various stations throughout the 
city receive $750 a year. 

Besides, the women teachers feel that the question whether 
they are receiving more money than they are worth is not a 
valid subject for discussion in this campaign for equal pay, 
because the male teachers occupying identical positions are 
receiving from fifty to a hundred per cent, more than the wo- 
men teachers, yet the same men teachers are besieging the 



464 EQUAL PAY_ FOR EQUAL WORK 

Board of Education, the Charter Revision Committee and the 
Charter Legislative Committe for more pay. 

In answer to the second question, I have no long list of 
statistics to offer to prove that Mromen are as constant in 
attendance as the male teachers. 

I can only say that in my own case I was absent only two 
days out of the first twelve years of my teaching, and that 
absence was due to a combination of grip and toothache. I 
know another teacher who was not absent or late once in her 
first seventeen years of teaching. 

In my capacity of district superintendent, when examining 
teachers for a renewal of license, or for a certificate of approval 
of service, I always ask this question: 

" How often have you been late or absent from school in 
the past three years?" 

And it is not at all unusual for me to receive the answer: 

" Not once." 

I am sure that there is no department of the public service 
where the employees render such faithful attendance as the 
women teachers do in the public school system of the greater 
city. 

OUT-OF-TOWN EDITORIALS 

No doubt the fact that as a rule the teachers of the com- 
mon schools are underpaid and that the salaries doled out to 
women have been so low as to offer small temptation to male 
competition has had much to do with bringing about the pre- 
ponderance of women teachers. But it is certain that it is not 
an unhealthy preponderance. The most unsatisfactory feature 
of the employment of women grows out of the fact that very 
few enter upon the profession of teaching as a permanent oc- 
cupation. The disparity in wages of the sexes is altogether 
wrong. For the like service there should be the like pay, and 
no female wageworker in any field of endeavor more honestly 
earns her pay than the teacher. — Philadelphia Record, 1907. 

PAY FOR SERVICE RENDERED 

In New York equal pay for teachers has long been agitated. 
Governor Hughes stands in the way, but the women expect 
to triumph despite his opposition. Naturally, such a question 
has brought out many conflicting opinions. Whether a teacher 
has to support one person with his or her earnings or half a 
dozen should have nothing to do with the question. What the 
taxpayers want are the best teachers that can be obtained, 
whether men or women. School boards should make no 
distinction based either on sex or the number of teachers' de- 
pendent relatives. If the teacher engaged fills the bill that 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 465 

teacher, whether man or woman, should be paid all that the 
taxpayers of the employing community are able to pay for 
such services. So far as teachers are concerned the public 
should never be a charitable institution. — San Francisco 
Btilletin. 

The proposition for equal pay for men and women teachers 
has again failed in New York. A fellow writes to one of the 
papers suggesting that the next effort at equalization of teach- 
ers' pay be made by going after the pay of the men teachers 
in the hope of slicing it down to the figure paid the women 
teachers. There are more ways than one of going at a subject 
to bring about the desired end. That man understands how 
to enlist support for the movement to raise the women teach- 
ers' pay.— Vindicator, Youngstown, Ohio, May 19, 1909. 

EDUCATIONAL COMMENT 

Equal Pay. — It has been left for the New York teacher to 
contend for a principle of momentous importance to the entire 
working world of the public service, a principle as certain to 
redress the wrongs of the men who work as to remedy the in- 
justices to the women. 

It was left for the New York schoolma'ams to take up the 
fight for equal pay and to protest against this short-sighted 
lowering of the standard of the public service, and official 
branding of woman's labor as cheap labor. For if there is to 
be sex discrimination in labor, even to the statute books, the 
temporary competition of women workers in new fields who 
lower the rate of wage throughout the labor market will become 
a fixed and persistent condition. Every cry for more economy 
in the schools, in the public service everywhere, and in the 
industries will result in driving out more men workers and in- 
stalling more women in their place. This has already been the 
case in the schools. 

Sex discrimination in labor is a boomerang that rebounds to 
the injury of those who launch it forth. As related to the 
schools, if we are " feminizing " our schools, as has been 
charged, and if the schoolmaster abroad, who was so great an 
institution in the first century or so of American national life, 
has well-nigh disappeared, his elimination has been largely due 
to the economy of women's labor. However cheap women's 
labor in the school may be in its money value, it is good labor 
and of high educational value; and the better it is and the 
higher its quality the stronger the argument for equal pay for 
it as a matter of justice to the men as well as to the womeia.— 
Albany Argus, November 7, 1907. 



466 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 



TEACHERS' WAGES 

Steadily the demand for uniform wages for teachers, male 
and female, is gaining ground, despite the fact that it has re- 
ceived temporary setbacks here and there. It is generally 
known, we believe, that " The Citizen " is no advocate of woman 
suffrage; it subscribes nothing to the doctrine of equal rights 
in all things, but it has always declared that where a woman 
does a man's work, she should receive a man's pay. We fully 
believe with Elbert Hubbard that: 

" The one-price system is a matter of ethics. It has come 
to stay. We also believe in paying a like wage for a siinilar 
service. 

"This question has come to Albany for legal decision: Shall 
not women teachers be paid the same as men for doing the 
same grade and quality of work? Most of the states in the 
union have not even dared bring it up. 

" If we were having our first look at the question we would 
say it was too childish a matter for consideration — there is only 
one side to it. In a hundred years it will be ridiculed as a relic 
of barbarism. But to-day it is a fight that must be decided by 
the legislature and an executive. 

" When woman began to teach, to earn a little money and 
have a degree of independence, it was so great a joy that she 
accepted the gift of the gods without question as to whether 
she were receiving all that was her due. She had nothing to 
measure up her present condition with but her past, and all was 
favorable. 

" But as the years went by and doors great and small flew 
open at her touch she drew points of comparison and the in- 
justice of man's drawing the line where God had not, worked 
into her heart. 

" At first woman was given only the less responsible positions 
in teaching. Now she is a co-worker with man — co-ordinates 
him. 

"And I have seen no argument brought forward by the male 
teacher that touched upon the justice of paying one human 
being more than another for the same effort and the same re- 
sults. The men have ostensibly fallen back on Bobby Burns 
and i'ween i'faith, 'A mon's a men for a' that.'" — Atlanta 
Citizen. 

"EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK" 

Once more the cry for more pay has been raised in New York 
by the female teachers in the public schools. These very unreason- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 467 

able persons say that when they do identically the same work that 
men do they ought to receive equal pay. A whole lot of people 
throughout the State will sympathize with them in their claims. 
There is really no convincing argument against the contention 
except the financial one, " We can"t afford it." A great city which 
is teaching its young the great lessons of justice and fair play can 
hardly afford to set the example of lowering womanhood. In a 
free-for-all foot race where women and men were admitted there 
would be no question about awarding the whole prize to the woman 
in the case if she happened to win the race. And there is no reason 
why the woman who does effectual work in instilling knowledge 
into the minds of the young should not receive just as much as 
the man who has been doing the same work, and in many instances 
probably not as well as the woman. To be sure the Governor has 
vetoed one bill which provided for equal pay for equal work, but 
if New York shows a disposition to be fair and treat its employees 
with justice it is hardly probable the State Executive will interfere. 
It might be a good idea for the city to use the money which has 
been paid to the fellows with easy jobs toward rewarding the 
teachers of the public schools who are accomplishing something. 
There may be a difference of opinion as to the desirability of giving 
the woman the ballot, but there can be no just ground for offering 
a man $900 for doing certain specific things and a woman only 
$600 for doing the same things and doing them just as well. — 
Rochester Union and Advertiser, Feb. 4, 1910. 

" EQUAL SALARY " BILL 

The persistent fight made last year in the Legislature by the 
women teachers of New York city was not in vain. If it did noth- 
ing else, it has focused the attention of the people upon the in- 
equality of salaries paid to men and women teachers. We believe 
it will do more than that. We believe it was the entering wedge, 
the leaven that shall in time make for better conditions and better 
pay for the whole teaching staff of the State. It cannot possibly 
be otherwise. That is, if school boards and authorities have the 
intelligence we believe they have. Woman is no longer a slave 
or a plaything. Here in America she is treated as an equal in 
nearly all respects to man. In some cases, however, especially in 
the line of endeavor to battle with the world and earn her own 
living, the idea is still clung to that she is inferior and therefore 
should receive an inferior salary. This idea is gradually wearing 
away. And nothing will hasten it more than united effort on their 
part — effort such as the Interborough Teachers' Association made 
at Albany last year. Knowing they are right, they should rush on 
to the goal of " equal pay for equal work." — The Dutchess County 
Democrat and People's Plain Spokesman, January 18, 1908. 



468 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ALL EYES NOW ON SENATOR WHITE'S BILL 

"Equal Pay for Equal Work" Measure up for Action 

The Onondaga Representative will Move the Passage of His Pet 
Bill this Week — It Seems Certain the Senate will Pass It 

Albany, March 23. — Senator Horace White will move the passage 
of the New York city school teachers' " Equal Pay " bill this week, 
and from a poll made of the Senate last week the indications are 
that it will pass by a very comfortable majority. Only five votes 
were cast against it last year in the Upper House. The passing 
of a resolution by the New York city Board of Aldermen last 
week favoring the passage of the bill has strengthened the teachers' 
cause among many Senators and Assemblymen who have heretofore 
been classed as " doubtful." 

No bill that has come up before the Legislature in recent years 
has been subject to so much public discussion on the platform and 
in the press as the " Equal Pay " bill. It has been discussed from 
one end of the State to the other. Chambers of Commerce, Boards 
of Trade, women's clubs, men's clubs, labor organizations, school 
teachers' clubs and even in the Grange the question of " equal pay 
for equal work" has been the subject of public discussions, espe- 
cially in New York and Brooklyn. 

" The White Bill " once passed the Senate and House, but did 
not pass the Governor. A well founded rumor has been in circula- 
tion in Albany for several weeks that the Governor has quietly 
told his friends that he does not want Senator White's bill put up 
to him again. The reason is very plain. 

Ever since the Interborough Association of Women Teachers, 
led by Miss Grace C. Strachan, began the fight for " Equal Pay 
for Equal Work " the Governor and the Senators and Assemblymen 
have been bombarded with requests to come to the rescue of the 
women teachers who have been so unjustly discriminated against 
by the New York city Board of Education. From Chancellor 
James R. Day of Syracuse University down to the humblest citizen 
of New York and Brooklyn the capitol has been flooded with 
petitions to help the women teachers. The bill has been strongly 
endorsed in every city from Long Island to Dunkirk and from 
Ogdensburg to Elmira. 

The friends of Governor Hughes intimate that he hesitates this 
year at flying in the face of public opinion by vetoing Senator 
White's bill. A veto in a Presidential campaign that will be at 
fever heat about the time that all thirty-day bills have to be signed 
or allowed to become laws would work to the disadvantage of the 
Governor, say his friends, and those who are close to him are 
working hard to prevent the bill from reaching him. Failing in 
that they will advise him to allow it to become a law in view of 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 469 

the fact that so many prominent men and women in Greater New 
York and elsewhere have petitioned for the signing of the " White 
Bill." Among the hundreds of organizations outside of Greater 
New York that have asked the Governor to sign the bill are the 
New York State Wlorkingmen's Federation of Labor, the New 
York State Locomotive Enginemen and Firemen and the Trades 
Assemblies in Rochester, Syracuse, Elmira, Troy, Albany, Utica, 
Yonkers, Poughkeepsie, Jamestown, Binghamton, Schenectady and 
other cities. 

Those who are closely following the movements of Senator 
White's pet bill say that it has a better chance of becoming a 
law this year than it did last. One who has been instrumental 
in shaping the destinies of the " Equal Pay " bill said to-day that 
there is more inside politics being played in behalf of this measure 
than thought. — Utica Observer, March 23, 1908. 

TEACHERS FIGHTING FOR GOOD CAUSE 

With right and justice behind them, the women teachers of 
Greater New York are again knocking at the door of the Senate 
and Assembly and also at the door of Governor Hughes for their 
" Equal Salary" bill. The Governor last year put this question 
up to the New York City Board of Education, but the board has 
taken no notice as yet of the Governor's words and it would seem 
that it is the duty of the Legislature and the Governor to compel 
the board to pay the women teachers the same salaries as are paid 
to the men, as both are doing the same class of work — Editorial 
Plattsburgh Republican, February 8, 1908. 

NOT BENEVOLENT 

The public schools are not an eleemosynary institution. They 
are not to be administered as public benevolence. They are a part 
of the regulated machinery of the community, and any disposition 
to treat them as benevolent factors is a perversion of the fact and 
intention, as well as the conditions of support of the schools.— 
Baltimore American. 

EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Certain periods in the world's history are referred to as " Dark 
Ages." When one reflects on the present inequality of men and 
women in political and industrial life, the historians of the future 
will probably characterize the century now passing as the " Age of 
Injustice." 

The spirit of American rights is proclaimed in the magnificent 
protest, which says: "Taxation without representation is tyranny." 
Yet the majority of American women pay taxes without repre- 



470 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

sentation, and women can be hanged by laws in the making of 
which they have no voice. 

Wherever women, as a class, are degraded in political, industrial 
or social life the men have a correspondingly low standard. There- 
fore the contention for " Equal Pay for Equal Work " will be the 
great factor for a better industrial condition for men, for where 
women's wages are low the men are correspondingly poorly paid. 

This question of " Equal Pay for Men and Women Teachers " 
was defeated at a special meeting of the New York board of edu- 
cation held this week. The vote was 23 to 16, against the measure. 
Fifteen men and one woman voted in favor of it. Twenty men 
and three women voted against it. 

Mr. Stern said to equalize the women's pay would cost the city 
from $7,000,000 to $11,000,000 annually. Admitted that this is a 
very large increase, but if it was an increase for men would it not 
be considered? Then why should men in the same grades in the 
schools doing exactly the same work, often not as good, receive a 
much larger salary than women do? If economy is the slogan, 
make the pay equal, regardless of sex. 

Mr. Martin said : " The schedule prepared by the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers should be called not ' equal pay 
for equal work ' but ' equal pay for equal age,' as it based its 
increase on length of service." The Interborough Association of 
Teachers should realize the value of experience in dealing with 
children, and also the fact that the teachers recognize that time 
brings knowledge and matures the mind. This certainly should not 
militate against the teachers' graded scale, but rather it should 
be a recognized tribute to their sense of justice. Evidently Mr. 
Martin is not logical. Moreover the graduate scale is not the whole 
contention, but the fact that the men in the same grades are re- 
ceiving much larger salaries than are the women for the same 
work, and the question is "Why?" 

Again Mr. Martin said " that these teachers take the attitude that 
we (the board of education) must give it to them." Why not? 
Is not that the exact attitude that was assumed by our Revolution- 
ary ancestors in their appeal to England? It was very effective, 
and the present one will prove to be equally so. 

Commissioner Barrett said " the fact that one-twelfth of the 
teachers receive a certain salary is not a good reason that the 
other eleven-twelfths should receive the same salary." If they do 
exactly the same work, why should they not receive the same salary? 
When Mayor McClellan appointed three women on the board of 
education last fall, many thought the millennium for women had 
arrived. While appreciative of the ex-mayor's act in recognizing 
women, many deplored the fact that three society women who 
never knew what it was to need or earn a dollar, had been selected 
to represent 15,000 teachers, who are engaged daily in the most 
difficult work of disciplining and educating about 50 children each 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 471 

crowded in one room. These children represent all classes in 
the community, possess all degrees of ability and lack of it, and 
have a variety of temperaments and different degrees of morality. 
These teachers meet all conditions at least five hours each day in 
school, and when one considers the price of food and the number 
often depending upon them for support, it is conceivable that they 
sometimes lack the comforts of life to which they are entitled. 
That even one woman member of the New York board of educa- 
tion, Mrs. Christine Towns, voted for equal pay is to her credit, 
and she is to be congratulated. 

The great need in industrial success is the unity of interests of 
men and women. It is one of the enigmas of modern life that 
the literal striking of a woman would brand the offender as a 
social outcast, while in an economic way, the deadliest blows may 
be struck at her with impunity, while it is a fact that no class 
in the community is a greater barrier to better industrial condi- 
tions for men than are the women who do not believe in "equal 
pay for equal work." 

EQUAL PAY FOR WOMEN 

The New York board of education has just rejected the plea of 
the women teachers in the public schools of that city for equal 
pay for equal work, as compared with men. The justice of this 
demand by the women teachers is readily apparent; but their case 
is no exception to the rule in the public school system of the 
country. Women teachers rarely in any city or state get the same 
salary for the same work, often done very much better than men 
teachers perform it. 

The wisdom of women competing with men in some walks of 
professional life may well be disputed, but in the school room there 
is work to be done which women are pecularly well fitted to per- 
form. Even here there are duties which cannot be best discharged 
by women, but these are exceptional. In the graded schools of 
the country the great majority of the teachers are women, and the 
faculties of the high schools contain at least an equal number of 
women and men. Under what possible theory of justice is a 
woman paid less than a man for the same work? 

The question is not whether a man should do the work. That 
has been settled by the universal recognition of women's paramount 
qualification for certain departments of instruction. There certainly 
is something grotesque, to say the least, in the inequity of making 
the male teacher's salary larger than that of the woman teacher 
who works in the next room at the same task. 



PART IV— CHAPTER I 
LETTERS 

Personally, however, I have never been able to see any good 
reason w^hy a person who performs the same kind of work equally 
as well should be paid any less because she happens to be a woman. 
I am perfectly willing that you should use my name, but it must not 
be as the President of the Brooklyn League, only in my individual 
capacity. 

GEORGE W. BRUSH (Ex-Senator). 

I am very much in sympathy with your movement. I have 
learned through much experience that there are many things that 
women can do equally as well as men, and whenever a woman 
performs a service as well as a man I believe she should have the 
same pay. I have often said that the best teacher I ever had in 
my life was a woman, and strange to say, the subjects that she 
taught were higher mathematics. 

GAGE E. TARBELL. 

Jan. 30, 1908. 

Any time I can be of service to your cause I will do anything 
in my power. 

CHARLES J. TAYLIABUE. 
Feb. 8, 1908. 

If I can aid the movement in any way I hereby write myself 
down as awaiting instruction. 

THOS. J. CUMMINGS. 
Jan. 29, 1908. 

I gladly accept the honor of again saying a good word in favor 
of the equalization salary bill. (In re the Mayor's hearing, May 

II, 1909-) 

WILLIAM A. COKELEY, Bronx. 
May 5, 1909. 

It has been a pleasure for me to do what I can in the interest 
of your cause. 

NATHANIEL H. LEVI. 

I heartily endorse the White Bill equalizing teachers' salaries 
and 1 most respectfully and earnestly urge you to approve the bill. 

472 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 473 

As the present injustice originated with the Legislature in the 
Davis Law, I believe that the proposed White Bill in correcting 
this injustice in no way interferes with the principle of home 
rule. 

Respectfully yours, 

W. E. VERITY, 
President, Brooklyn Lumber Company. 
To Gov. Hughes, May i, 1907. 

Sir: At the hearing on the Teachers' Bill this morning, it 
seemed to me that no very strong argument was advanced in op- 
position. The "home rule" objection might be reasonable, if the 
teachers had not already appealed to the Board of Education and 
failed to get a square deal. The gross disproportion in the 
schedule of salaries between men and women is too glaring to be 
successfully ignored in a profession for which women are so 
eminently fitted. Simple justice for a most faithful body of 
public servants demands the relief sought by this bill. 

As a taxpayer I would esteem it a privilege to bear my share 
of the resultant cost. The opportunity is yours to see that the 
scales of justice are balanced evenly. 

Very respectfully, 

ALBERT E. DAVIS. 
To Mayor McClellan, May 11, 1909. 

I am deeply interested in the success of any progressive move- 
ment such as yours is. 

In my mind, it is merely a matter of time before you achieve 
what you are striving for, because the trend of our civilization is 
to insure deserving equality. 

" Equal pay for equal work " is logically fair and square, and 
you will undoubtedly win to it soon. 
With my best wishes, 

ARTHUR L. GILLAM. 

Mar., 1910. 

I wi'ote to Mayor McClellan that I was strongly in favor of 
equal pay for equal work and asked him to sign the bill. 

FRED. NATHAN. 
May 10, 1909. 

I have followed your efforts in the newspapers and have been 
very sorry to see that you have met with a temporary defeat. 
Continue your efforts and you must, in time, succeed. The only 
way to get there is never to take a " knock-out blow," especially 
when you are in the right. 

W. G. McADOO. 

May 12, 1910. 



474 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

You have evidently been misinformed as to our not being In 
favor of the Teachers' Bill. We not only signed the petition but 
wrote a letter to Mayor McClellan endorsing the bill. 

FREDERICK LOESER & CO. 



The movement has my entire sympathy and I hope you will 
be successful in your endeavor to have the salaries of men and 
women teachers equalized. To claim that a man should have more 
pay than a woman because he may have more people dependent 
upon him is as absurd as to claim that a man with six children 
should have more pay than one with none. Neither the City nor 
any other employer should consider anything but whether the 
person is fitted to fill the place, salary being based on the work 
performed and not on sex. 

ARTHUR GIBB. 
(Frederick Loeser & Co.) 

Mar. 5, 1908. 



The opponents of the equal salaries bill seem to place their re- 
liance for a veto on two things, " the expense to the city " and the 
"principle of home rule." 

The first is, of course, a mere pretense. You are not asking 
for a mere increase in salary, but for justice. In regard to the 
second, stress is laid upon the fact that Governor Hughes has 
vetoed two bills that conflicted with the principle, and your friends, 
the enemy, hope that the Mayor will look upon your bill as a 
violation of the same principle. 

As to the two bills referred to, it may be said that they are 
political dickers, pure and simple, and the governor does not look 
with favor upon such interesting items, but, in the case of your 
bill, your grievance was first presented to the " home rulers," who 
have power in the matter, and they, to use a common but com- 
prehensive expression, turned it down. In such a case, the principle 
of home rule should not prevail. There is not, in any sense, any 
politics in your bill, and it cannot consistently be vetoed on the 
ground held in the other two vetoes. 

It is to be hoped that both the Mayor and the governor will 
look upon the matter in this light. 

The enclosed "pome," cut from the Home Edition of the Globe 
of May 3, is a disgraceful production, and I should think that 
" Dr." Cronson and the members of his Association would be 
ashamed of themselves. 

E. O. STRATTON. 

May 5, 1905. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 475 

SHAW & CO., 

Real Estate Agents and Brokers. 

I most heartily endorse the equal pay bill, firmly believing that 
the servant is worthy of his hire. Trusting you will be successful, 

Yours truly, 

HENRY M. VELDERS. 
Shaw & Co. 
Mar. 26, 1908. 

THE CLERGY 

I have long been satisfied that the teachers in our public schools 
do not receive an adequate compensation. It is a position of such 
transcendent importance in its bearing upon the citizenship of 
the future that it is poor economy upon the part of the City to 
stint the salaries of those who are entrusted with the manners and 
instruction of its children ; and if women render the same service 
as men they should receive the same pay. 

Believe me, very truly yours, 

DAVID H. GREER, 
Bishop Episcopalian Diocese of New York. 
Feb. 24, 1908. 

I am glad to add my name to the list of those who sympathize 
v/ith your cause. I wish you and the teachers every success in 
this movement. The teachers' proposition, which you are so ably 
defending, is just and ought to be granted. 

WILLIAM A. COURTNEY, 
Bishop, New York Apostolate. 

To one that has taught or that observes thoughtfully it is 
obvious that the part performed in a community by a genuine 
teacher yields in importance to none and is approached by few. 
It is the teacher who, as a rule, leavens the human lump that 
is in time to crystallize into manhood and citizenship. We do not 
honor them sufficiently. When we pay them adequately it is 
somewhat grudgingly. We are willing for others to earn as much 
as they can. We are disposed to pay teachers as little as we can. 

What we have said is true of teachers generally. Pedagogical 
ability is not a matter of sex, but of intellectual and moral quality. 
A good teacher is good indifferently to gender. This being so 
there ought to be no distinction on grounds of sex in our treat- 
ment of them. 

And yet we have found it necessary to wage an organized fight 
in our Legislature in behalf of equal pay for women teachers. 



476 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

From the Jewish standpoint, the McCarren-Conklin bill is im- 
perative. While the teacher in Israel was usually a man the spirit 
of Judaism would accord the same dignity and desert to a woman. 
Every consistent Jew should favor such a measure. 

Opposition to equal pay to both sexes is bad economics. Re- 
muneration should be proportioned to work or product. From 
this standpoint some men are less deserving than their professional 
sisters. It is wide of the mark and ludicrous to argue that a 
woman needs less and should therefore receive less. Women do 
not always need less, but often are compelled by our inconsiderate 
masculine discrimination to adapt themselves to less. On several 
reasonable grounds women need more than men, but chiefly be- 
cause of their greater dependency. If need is to be a criterion of 
wages the salaries of men themselves should not be uniform. The 
needs of men are diverse. 

Refusal to pay women of equal competence equally with men is 
a vestige of that primitive social state where man was master and 
woman subordinate. The age of masculine assumption is a re- 
grettable historic memory. Its spirit of brutal male domination 
should also be throttled. It is a boast of our civilization to have 
emancipated woman. Let us make good our claim. Let us not 
glory in a hollow pretense. We grant women equal opportunities 
and privileges. Let us consistently award them equal pay. 

RABBI ALEXANDER LYONS, Brooklyn. 

Extract from sermon, March 22, 1907. 

I hold that "the laborer is worthy of his hire," and I do not 
see any justice in a deviation from that on the ground of sex. 
Women who perform the duties of professorships in our best 
colleges receive compensation on a par with men, and I have 
not heard eminent educators, or any other persons, raise objec- 
tions. This, it seems to me, answers the contention of some that, 
while women should receive equal pay with men who teach younger 
children, they should not where higher branches are taught. 

It is generally agreed that women are far more capable than 
men in dealing with children under the age of fifteen years. Why, 
then, do they not receive more than men teachers who deal with 
pupils of the same age? 

The main argument of the men teachers appears to be that men 
are heads of families, and, therefore, have greater expenses to 
meet. Along with this is the advancement of the contention that 
the family is the unit of the nation, the father the head of it, 
and nothing should be done to impair his place in the sociolog- 
ical scale. 

To this I answer that, while the theory is not to be denied, 
the fact is that in innumerable instances women are the main- 
stay of families. I believe women who teach generally aid in the 
support of their families. 



EQUAL, 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 477 

Another thing: It is a fact that a large number of the women 
teachers in this city have come here from other places and have 
to support themselves just as the bachelor teachers — and how 
many of them there are ! — do. I do not argue that the men do not 
deserve all they get; I mean simply to insist that women should 
not be discriminated against because they are women. 

Of course, it would cost the city a great deal more money to 
pay women teachers salaries equal to men's. But here is no place 
for econom}'. Instead, a cut should be made in other city depart- 
ments where men hold down sinecures due to political pull. Men 
teachers have votes, too, and there is the rub, in some degree. 
Many politicians fear to estrange men teachers' votes by uphold- 
ing the cause of women who toil in our public schools. 

It is all a matter of common justice — this equal pay demand. 
It is a principle already established in some cities in this and 
other states, and in time I hope and believe that equal pay will 
be the rule in the pubHc schools of the greatest of American cities. 

ROBERT E. JONES. 
Canon, Cathedral of St. John the Divine. 

Glad to be a vice-president. (Carnegie Hall Mass Meeting.) 

CHARLES P. FAGNANI, D. D. 
Dec. 1909. 

Dr. Aked has received your letter of yesterday's date, request- 
ing him to act as Honorary Vice-President. He has instructed 
me to say " with pleasure." 



Dec. igog. 

My sympathies are with you. 



DUNCAN J. McMillan. 



(Rev.) W. N. ACKLEY. 



I heartily believe in your worthy cause. Your efforts for justice 
and righteousness will ultimately prevail, and I wish you every 
success in your laudable endeavors. 

Invoking the Divine blessing upon you and all associated with 
you in your demands for justice. I remain. 

Sincerely yours, 

(Rev.) GEORGE ADAMS. 
Feb. 29, 1908. 

I am writing to assure you of my thorough sympathy for your 
cause, or the cause of anyone, who makes bold to say: "What's 
mine is mine." I have watched the matter anxiously, confident 
Governor Hughes would favor you, provided the bill presented 
truly set forth the situation; and, so far as I have been able to 
observe, the best argument, emanating from the camp of the op- 



478 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

position, is that it will cost some odd millions of dollars more 
for the state to sustain the schools, should your request be granted. 

Assuming this to be true, then someone in the past has been 
paid too much as someone has been paid too little — that was a 
degenerate past, before " knighthood was in flower." We can 
hardly expect those who are paid too much to become generous 
and turn over the extra to those who were paid too little; but 
"we do expect justice and equity for the future. We who believe 
in the Golden Rule, as a corollary therefrom, believe we should 
pay a woman as much for a spool of silk, an apple pie, or an 
education, as we pay a man for the above mentioned features of 
graceful existence. 

Those who do not appear to believe in the Golden Rule say 
this reform will cost millions, therefore drop it. One might as 
well say it will cost money to build bridges and subways for 
our vast city, therefore do not build them; it will cost millions 
to maintain courts of justice, therefore do not maintain them. I 
know of no worthy cause that succeeds without effort or cost — 
such an argument is unworthy of the most ordinary politician. 
If the thing is right, we'll have it; if not, we'll drop it. 

As I understand it, you want the pay to balance the job, with- 
out reference to sex, race, religion or previous condJtion of 
servitude, on the part of the incumbent. 

Do not worry, you will have that as truly as water runs down 
hill. There are oceans of injustice in the world; but the world 
is growing better all the time. 

And, " I doubt not, through the ages, one unceasing purpose 
runs; and the minds of men will broaden, with the process of the 
sums." 

Therefore, be not over-anxious, just keep busy and that better 
day will come. 

You recall what Lincoln said about " fooling the people " — that 
is as true to-day as when first uttered. 

Your cause is a splendid one — such reforms always cost sacri- 
fice commensurate with the value of success ; eventually the 
puerile arguments sink into oblivion, and the just cause has an 
honored past in the drama of civilization. 

Sincerely, 
LYNN P. ARMSTRONG, Pastor, 
Cuyler Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn. 

Feb. IS, 1908. 

I am in full sympathy with you in this fight for "Equal Pay." 
(Rev.) J. G. BACCHUS, Brooklyn. 

I am heartily in favor of the Equal Pay Measure which you 
are so ably and eloquently advocating. Were we dependent on men 
for the education of our children most of the schools would he 




Hon. Reuben L. Gledhill, 
Pathee of Senate "Equal Pay Bill," 1909. 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 479 

closed to-morrow. My observation and careful study of the ques- 
tion compel the conviction that the male teachers have no mo- 
nopoly of brains or brilliance. The work of the average male 
teacher is not one whit superior to that of the average female 
teacher. Then why discriminate? In Plato's Republic woman 
occupies an inferior place because she is a woman. The Amer- 
ican Republic will not be guilty of such an ancient and inex- 
cusable anachronism. 

All argument based on feminine mental and pedagogical inferi- 
ority is too puerile to be seriously combated. That based on in- 
creased taxation should be met by the frank rebuttal that a glar- 
ing injustice is never ultimately economical, and by the very im- 
portant fact that the larger amount of the budget for equal pay 
would only mean a few extra cents per capita of the vast body 
of taxpayers. Personally, I can begrudge nothing to the noble 
men and women who consecrate themselves to the glorious task 
of educating the children of our city. New York holds her 
head too proudly high to discount the female teachers who are 
of more value than her sky scrapers. 

Yours faithfully, 

AUGUSTUS E BARNETT, 
Tremont Methodist Episcopal Church, Bronx. 

March 17, 1908. 

I would be happy to attend this evening. I approve its object, 
but other engagements prevent attendance. 

JONATHAN BARSTOW, 
Pastor Second Ave. Baptist Church. 

I appreciate the importance of the work you have undertaken, 
and believe in the righteousness of your cause. 

L. W. BATTEN, 
Rector, St. Mark's Church, New York. 

Thank you for the information you sent me. 
I believe in the principle of compensation. " The laborer is 
worthy of his hire," and every laborer deserves adequate com- 
pensation for the service he renders. 

I should be glad to see the salary question adjusted in such a 
way that the standard would be not age or sex but service. 

JOHN L. BELFORD, 
Pastor, Roman Catholic Church — The Nativity. 
March 11, 1908. 

Our warmest sympathies are with your meeting and its object. 

m W. BELLINGER. 
Vicar, St. Agnes' Chapel, 
Dec, 1909. 



48o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I thoroughly believe in the justice of the proposed bill that 
provides " that where men and women are appointed to position 
of the same grade or rank, they shall receive the same pay," and 
can not understand how any man of the true modern spirit can 
oppose it 

WILLIAM M. BRUNDAGE. 
Pastor, Unity Church, Brooklyn. 
Feb. 26, 1908. 

I have already expressed my belief in the justice of this simple 
claim : that whenever equal work is done by teachers, sex should 
have no deterrent influences, but equal pay should be given to 
all. I trust this plain, straightforward statement will aid your 
cause. I wish that there were more men in the teaching profes- 
sion and better pay for all concerned in it. 

Yours ever, 

S. PARKES CADMAN, 
Central Congregational Church, Brooklyn. 

I am in fullest sympathy with your movement. There has re- 
cently come to my notice a case in our city, where a lady princi- 
pal receives only about half as much salary as a gentleman in a 
nearby school, who supervises fewer teachers by several. I fully 
believe great injustice is being done the noble band of "women 
teachers " in our great city. I trust the meeting to-night will 
prove a great popular movement in the right direction and that 
your cause will prevail with Governor and Mayor alike. 

J. W. CAMPBELL, Pastor, 
Washington Heights Methodist Episcopal Church. 

■ I trust that your bill will become a law. The sex of a 

teacher as regards proper compensation, is as irrelevant as the 
sex of an animal in a beautiful painting, or the sex of the painter 
in a true piece of art. The value of a teacher's services lies not 
in sex, but in pedagogic results. I do not see what sex has to 
do with education in the realm of economics. I do see what it 
involves in the realm of morals. 

SYDNEY HERBERT COX, Pastor, 
The Church of the Evangel, Congregational, Flatbush. 

It has been a source of perplexity to me to understand why there 
should be any controversy at all about the question, referred to in 
your note. It seems to me perfectly obvious that it is sheer 
injustice to give a woman who does the same work as a man 
less compensation than he receives, only because she is a woman. 
I have kept somewhat in touch with the discussion and I do not 
recollect a single good reason advanced for beclouding the simple 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 481 

unimpeachable principle of equal pay for equal work. I am most 
heartily in sympathy with the movement to give the women 
teachers their rights in the premises. I recall reading somewhere 
that the effect of the success of this agitation would be to con- 
fer such a condition of independence upon the women teachers 
as to deter them from marriage. That I believe to be rot; in- 
sanely amusing rot, but rot just the same. Even if it were so I 
cannot but think it a piece of singular good fortune that would 
keep them from linking their lives with those of some of the 
specimens who plume themselves on being the " lords of creation." 
I fear I am far too obscure to be of much service for the 
triumph of your cause. I can only say that I am unreservedly in 
favor of putting an end to this long standing and shameful in- 
equality. The legislature must somehow be made to realize that 
there are votes behind your demands. That is the consideration 
which seems to be most potent with most of those who make 
our laws. 

JOSEPH F. DELANY, Rector, 
St. Malachy's Roman Catholic Church. 
Mar. 17, 1908. 

By all means consider me heartily in favor of the school teach- 
ers' demands. Any word or effort of mine that may assist you in 
your honest endeavors to obtain what to me seems simply " justice," 
count as yours to have and to use at any time. With best wishes 
in Christ. 

JOHN H. DOOLEY, Roman Catholic Rector, 
Corpus Christi Chapel, New York. 

(To Mayor McClellan.) 
Honorable Sir: 
In signing the " Gledhill-Foley Teachers' Bill," I am certain 
you will be actuated by the American spirit of justice. I am con- 
vinced that you are persuaded that where skill, labor or com- 
modities are bought and sold, equivalent compensation should 
be given for equal service, irrespective of the sex, color, race or 
nationality of the producer. 

By giving the above named Bill your approval, I believe you 
will commend your sense of exact right. 

Yours cordially, 

JOHN DONALDSON, Pastor, 

Union Course Baptist Church. 
May 9, 1909. 

" Every problem of life must find its final solution in the light 
of the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and according 
to the practical application of the Golden Rule every contention, 



482 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

every cause, every issue, must be viewed in this light and settled 
upon this basis. World-wide problems, national issues, local is- 
sues, personal matters, must all be settled upon this basis. Per- 
fectly germain to this line of thought is that matter of vital 
importance to the women teachers in our public schools, and it 
should be regarded as a matter of vital importance to us all. I 
need not reflect upon the intelligence of this large congregation 
by pausing, even for a moment, to explain what the White bill 
is. I need only to assume that you are posted, and well posted, 
upon all such matters as are of common interest to us. You 
know that the chief objection to the passing of the McCarren- 
Conklin bill which the noble army of women teachers have en- 
dorsed has been this : It means an increase of nine millions of 
dollars which our taxpayers must meet. A number of other ob- 
jections have been made, but this seems to be the most formidable 
and persistent of them all. The objection cannot be justified in 
fact, and sustained by principle. It would mean an increase of 
about six millions to our taxpayers and not nine millions as has 
been claimed. It does mean that our women teachers shall have 
simple justice done them, nothing more, nothing less. It means 
that a woman shall be paid just as much as a man for the same 
service, equally well, if not better, rendered. It means that our 
people, who must finally settle everything, are not willing that so 
many of the best and influential persons that we have, our women 
teachers, shall continue to suffer an injustice simply because they 
happen to be women. Our mothers and sisters who can influence 
the voters, our politicians who hold their positions according to 
the decrees of the voters, our noble Governor of the State of 
New York, of whom we are justly proud, all these should be 
heard from and in the name of chivalry, in the name of grateful 
parents who appreciate the intellectual and moral worth of these 
women, in the name of a cause broader than any creed, in the 
name of justice, let us settle this matter which ought to be settled 
only in one way, and that in the right way. Settle this and every- 
thing else according to the Golden Rule, and always behave as 
the children of God." — Extract from sermon, Rev. Luther B. Dyott, 
United Congregational Church, Brooklyn. 

I am in fullest sympathy with your effort to secure (regard- 
less of sex) equal pay for positions of the same grade or rank. 

W. R. ESTES, Pastor, 
Union Methodist Episcopal Church, Brooklyn. 
March 6, 1908. 

I wish I could be with you, and give you all the sympathy 
and aid in my power. 

WALTER A. A. GARDURI, Rector. 
Protestant Episcopal Church, West Houston Street 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 483 

I believe in your work and wish you success. 

(Rev.) GEORGE C. GROVES, Jr., 

Holy Cross Mission, Brooklyn. 
iMar. 4, 1908. 

The Parkside Christian Socialist Fellowship heartily endorses the 
" Equal Pay Bill " supported by the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers. 

B. C. HAMMOND. 
Parkside Church, Presbyterian, 
March 26, igo8. Lenox Road, Flatbush. 

I am in most hearty accord with the efforts of the teachers in 
New York City to secure for their work the same compensation 
that is paid to men for the same work. I never could see any 
reason why there should be any discrimination. In a city so large 
and wealthy as is ours there can be no excuse for such injustice. 
I have found from observation that quite a large percentage of 
women teachers have others dependent upon them for support. For 
this reason they should be fairly compensated for their labor. I 
sincerely hope that the efforts which your society is making may 
be successful. 

RICHARD HARTLEY, Pastor, 

Feb. 13, 1908. Hope Baptist Church, New York. 

The movement has my entire sympathy and approbation. 

JOHN J. HEISCHMANN, D. D., Pastor, 
St. Peter's Evangelical Lutheran Church, Brooklyn. 
OVTar. 20, 1907. 

I do not think that the knowledge that I am in hearty agreement 
with you will add very materially to the weight of your argu- 
ment, unless there is some truth in the old saying that " many 
a meikle mak's a muckle." 

However, let me assure you that, speaking for myself, I can 
see no reason why the female teachers of our schools who are 
called upon to do exactly the same work as the male teachers 
should not get salaries on the same scale. This, I think, is funda- 
mental, and, simple as it seems, the whole burden of your argu- 
ment will need to be directed to the enlightenment of the citizens 
of the State upon this one point. Once our citizens become pos- 
sessed with the idea of the injustice of the two scales, relief will 
follow. If my voice can aid any in the rising cry, I am ready 
to shout. Wishing you the success you deserve in your effort, 
I am, 

JAMES BOYD HUNTER, Pastor, 
Anderson Memorial Reformed Church, New York. 

Mar. 9, 1908. 



484 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I will drop everything at the shortest notice and go anywhere 
at your call for your cause. 

ALEXANDER IRVINE, 

Church of the Ascension. 



Dec, 1909. 

Wishing you abundant success. 

Dec, 1909. 



T. J. LACEY, Rector, 

Church of the Redeemer. 



You may quote me as being in hearty sympathy with the prin- 
ciple of " equal pay for equal service." 

M. A. LAYTON, Pastor, 
DeKalb Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church. 

You may quote me anywhere as believing, that since, after years 
of demonstration, it is proved beyond a doubt that women make as 
effective teachers in the public schools as men, I am strongly of 
the opinion that when they do precisely the same work, and carry 
identical burdens, and show essentially the same results, that men 
and women should receive the same pay. 

CHARLES EDWARD LOCKE. 
Hanson Place Methodist Episcopal Church. 
March 5, 1908. 

I heartily approve your movement and endorse the principle 
upon which it is based. 

My convictions have grown out of thirtj^-five years' experience 
in school work in various capacities, — as teacher, City Superin- 
tendent, County Superintendent, College President, and other of- 
ficial positions. During my nine years' pastorate in this city, I have 
kept close touch with the public schools in an unofficial capacity. 
I am confirmed in the conviction that it is unfair and unjust to 
require a man and a woman to do the same amount and character 
in the same community upon different stipends. The evil is ag- 
gravated when the discrimination is against the sex which our 
civilization has always delighted to honor. And it seems almost 
pusillanimous when we remember that the favored sex has ex- 
clusive power in fixing the salaries. It is unmanly and un-Amer- 
ican to discriminate against a helpless class, however they may 
be differentiated, whether by race, color, or sex. 

DUNCAN J. McMillan, Pastor, 
New York Presbyterian Church, New York City. 

I am in full sympathy with your movement. 

(Rev.) D. J. McWILLIAM. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 485 

My sympathy is with you. 

(Rev.) G. MAINE. 

I am with you. Your contention is so just that it will ulti- 
mately prevail. 

REV. EDWARD McGUFFEY. 
Dec, 1909. 

With the purpose of your movement I am indeed in hearty 
sympathy. Woman has become economically free. This is a 
fact. The recognition of the fact by law makers and law admin- 
istrators and by the public generally, is only a question of time. 
Equal pay for equal work is one step in this direction. Work 
for it, and when you get it, as you will in time, take up the next 
step. 

JOHN HOWARD MELISH, Rector. 
Church of the Holy Trinity, Brooklyn. 

Mar. 4, 1908. 

I am very glad to go on record as favoring the " Equal Pay 
Bill." I have not heard a single argument against it which 
was worth repeating. It seems to me a question of common 
justice and withal of good economics. We need the best teachers 
we can procure for the children who are to become our citizens. 
To my mind, in the lower grades of our public schools, the 
woman is the greater power in training the boys for political 
and the girls for social influence. Especially in the congested 
districts of the city — like our East Side — the children need 
" mothering." Too frequently they do not receive it in the 
home. The woman teacher not only supplies this element, but 
is in no wise inferior to the man in her educational equipment 
and ability. I say this after careful consideration of the ques- 
tion. 

G. ERNEST MERRIAM, Pastor, 
Fourteenth Street Presbyterian Church, N. Y. 

April II, 1908. 

I am in thorough sympathy with your movement and have 
advocated it on numerous occasions. Permit me to congratu- 
late you on the same methods you are employing to enforce 
the demands of justice. We are living in an age when public 
opinion is the great ruling force in all departments of life. 
If we can educate and crystallize this all-pervading force, jus- 
tice will come of itself, without revolutionary tactics of any 
kind. "Whoever fights, whoever falls, justice conquers ever- 
more." 

GROVER G. MILLS, Pastor, 

Pilgrim Chapel, Brooklya. 

Feb. 29, 1908. 



486 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

" Equal pay for equal work " is common justice, both within 
and without the public schools. I, for one, cannot see why 
ability and efficiency should be discriminated against when 
dressed in gowns instead of pantaloons. You surely are right, 
so go ahead! 

L. K. MOORE, Pastor, 
Eighteenth Street M. E. Church, Brooklyn. 
Mar. 10, 1908. 

I am an ex-public school teacher, and I have always been 
strongly in favor of the movement for which you are working. 

HENRY MOTTET, Rector. 
Church of the Holy Communion, New York. 
Jan. 23, igo8. 

I believe that a woman doing equal work with a man should 
be paid the same compensation. 

FRANK PAGE, Rector. 
St. John's Church, Brooklyn. 
Jan. 22, 1908. 

In payment for service rendered the question of sex should 
not exclude honesty. Because I believe in the necessity of jus- 
tice and the essentialness of honorable treatment, your claim 
of "equal pay for equal work" appeals to me with the power 
of right and the persuasiveness of truth. 
Success to your cause. 

THOMAS EDWARD POTTERTON, Pastor, 

Church of Our Father, Brooklyn. 



I wish you success. 



PAUL H. SCHNATZ, Pastor, 
Martha Memorial Reformed Church. 



I desire to assure you of my deep sympathy with your cause 
and my firm conviction as to the righteousness of its principles. 
Last year I went to Albany to the public hearing before the 
Governor, representing the women teachers of Richmond Bor- 
ough, but you will recollect I had no opportunity to speak at 
the hearing because of the lack of time. I have written two or 
three times to my friend, Governor Hughes, urging his interest 
and support. If I can in any way help the cause for which you 
are so heroically struggling, I shall be glad to do so. 

REV. CHARLES SCHWEIKERT. 

You may count on me as heartily in favor of the success of 
the cause which you represent. 

I trust that you and your associates will not grow discour- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 487 

aged and give over your efforts, for you will assuredly yet win 
a memorable and justly deserved victory. Your cause is just 
and righteous, and men, although they are proverbially narrow 
when dealing in money matters with women, still they yet will 
see their error and grant your claim. Moral progress will not 
much longer tolerate delay. So-called logic may make crooked 
paths to get around the fixed principle — " Equal pay for equal 
work," but common sense and right reason will yet lead a re- 
luctant public opinion to right conclusions, and all the fair- 
minded will rejoice that the women have finally come into their 
own! 

G. E. STROWBRIDGE. Pastor, 
Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church. 
Feb. 5, 1908. 

It has always seemed to me that efficiency and not sex should 
determine compensation for service. The general principle 
enunciated by the Great Teacher when he sent forth those who 
were to be teachers " the laborer is worthy of his hire," is as 
true to-day as then, and if you shall find strong incentive for 
best possible equipment for your work and for the attainment 
of the highest success in your calling, you must be given to 
understand that all the rights and emoluments of your calling 
are available to you.. 

May your cause prevail. 

D. B. THOMPSON, Pastor, 
Park Avenue Miethodist Episcopal Church, N. Y. 

April 8, 1908. 

I hope you will be successful in your efforts toward receiving 
" Equal Pay for Equal Work." 

FRANK M. TOWNLEY, Rector, 
St. Bartholomew's Church. 

I am in sympathy with the movement for equal pay, and I 
think the plea is just, though in the present state of finance this 
might mean the reduction of the salaries of the male teaching 
force. 

F. TRACEY. 
The Church of the Redeemer, Brooklyn. 
Jan. 23, 1908. 

There is no sex in teaching, and there ought to be none io. 
pay. 

DR. HENRY VAN DYKE. 

As to the use of my name, I am perfectly willing to be quoted 
as heartily in favor of a just compensation for services ren- 
dered, whether by men or women, and as heartily, opposed to 



488 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

any discrimination in the matter of compensation, on the ground 
of difference in sex or anything else. Work should be recom- 
pensed according to its quality and quantity, whether the worker 
be man or woman, even though the man be the head of a 
household and the woman have no one else dependent upon her, 
(REV.) NEWELL WOOLSEY WELLS, 

Brooklyn. 
Feb. 29, 1908. 

I am in hearty sympathy with the effort of your Association. 

T. J. WHITAKER, Pastor. 
Bushwick Avenue Baptist Church, Brooklyn. 
Jan. 22, 1908. 

I am very much in favor of " Equal Pay " legislations 

A. ARCESE, Rector. 
St. Lucy's Roman Catholic Church, Brooklyn. 
Jan. 20, 1908. 

I am in deep sympathy with the movement and in favor of 
the proposed bill. 

LEIGHTON WILLIAMS, 
Amity House, New York City. 

EDITORS, LITTERATEURS AND ARTISTS 

Mr. Hearst has given instructions to all of his newspapers 
and to all of his editorial writers, to fight persistently on the 
side of the teachers and of the public school children. Mr. 
Hearst has said to me repeatedly that he considers the welfare 
of the public school children, and generous, appreciative treat- 
ment of public school teachers, the most important individual 
thing in our public life. 

The articles which you see in the paper, similar to the one 
of which you speak, are written in accordance with Mr. Hearst's 
personal and often-repeated instructions. 

A. BRISBANE, 
Editor, New York Journal. 

Sept. 26, 1907. 

I am very much interested in the work that women teachers 
do, unquestionably the most important daily work that is done 
in the world. I shall be glad to talk to your membership for 
a few minutes, as you suggest, if you want me to, but I am a 
pretty bad talker. 

A. BRISBANE, 
Editor, New York Journal. 
May 23, 1908. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 489 

Dear Miss Ennis: 

Your very kind favor has been forwarded to me. I am heartily 
in sympathy with the movement on the part of the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers to secure the full salaries paid 
to men teachers. My feelings have been expressed on this 
subject at various times, and I hope are well known in Brook- 
lyn. I certainly shall feel proud to be casually mentioned as an 
enthusiastic believer in your cause. If I felt that any word 
from me would aid you, I would be present at your meeting, 
and also volunteer to go to Albany to state your case, from 
my heart to the Legislative Committees. Do not be discouraged. 
Great battles for the right are not won easily. Common sense 
tells every rational man that teaching is an art that woman 
can practice as well if not with more success, than men. A 
man ought to be paid more money for carrying a hod or mixing 
mortar than a woman could earn at the same work, because 
she is unfitted for the labor, but she should be paid exactly what 
he receives, — if she be competent for the job. 

With the most sincere hope for and belief in your success, 
I am, yours faithfully, 

Mar. 2, 1908. JULIUS CHAMBERS. 

My Dear M'iss Corney: 

After studying over your question for nearly a month, I can 
make but one answer and that is it should be the quality of the 
work done and mot the sex of the worker which should govern 
the price. 

DAN BEARD. 

(Author of " Field and Forest Handy Book," " The American 
Boy's Handy Book," "The Outdoor Handy Book," "The Jack 
of All Trades," etc. E. C.) 

Dear Miss Corney. 

I have always believed that women should receive the same 
pay for the same work as men do. If a life is saved or a good 
deed performed, does God ask whether it was a man or a 
woman? You might as well pay more or less for services per- 
formed by those of different religious belief or political faith, 
A result obtained should be paid for without regard to who 
performed it. The rain falls alike on the just and unjust — if 
they haven't sense enough to go in out of the rain. Many 
women have those depending upon them for support the same 
as men. It certainly costs more to dress a woman than it 
does a man, especially when she is single. If it doesn't, it ought 
to. 

R. F. OUTCAULT, 
(Creator of Buster Brown) 

April 9, 1908. E. C. 



4QO EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I need hardly say I am entirely in sympathy with your move- 
ment. This sex bar is becoming quite ridiculous. 

FORBES-ROBERTSON. 

I do not think the pay for any position in the public service 
should depend upon whether the occupant is a man or a woman. 
I shall therefore be glad to be included among your vice-presi- 
dents. 

NORMAN HAPGOOD. 

Dec, 1909. Editor, Colliers Weekly. 

Israel Zangwill in a London speech denounced the flagrant in- 
justice of denying women equal recognition with men in their 
work in the profession. 

" EQUAL PAY " 

Under the rule of commercialism, labor receives only the cur- 
rent rate of wages. If sex makes labor cheaper, only the sex 
price will be paid in general business accordingly as we find 
that we can secure the service we need from either the potential 
father or the potential mother. Individual merit often rises 
above the limitations of sex, as thus. You may prefer an efficient 
woman in some particular line or capacity, even if nature at 
intervals interrupts her office attendance, to a man who, though 
even a little more efficient perhaps, is less faithful in the impera- 
tive routine because of the sin which doth most easily beset 
males. (Need I name it?) 

So we shall have to leave business to work out its own prob- 
lems, for it will always do so, even if strange Government 
policies are sometimes adopted with a view to making water 
run up hill without a pump. But although Government was 
first established as a selfish measure of mutual protection of the 
units of a community, it has grown to a moral ideal. It is 
ideals alone that make life worth living, and it is' reality alone 
that justifies the modern multifariousness of the activities of 
Government. Granting that almost self-evident proposition, 
the logical deduction is that the payments of Government for 
its machinery and the operators of it should be on a more moral 
basis than that of the individual units of a community, each 
struggling in the battle of bread-winning on the principle of 
" all's fair * * * jji war," but keeping truce in the communal 
organization. We aim to have a perfect Government even if 
our private lives are not aimed at perfection. And perfect 
Government demands that labor shall be paid under a scheme 
of equality; that qualification and merit shall be the test for 
allotting wages or other forms of remuneration — not color, nor 
religion, nor fashion, nor SEX. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 491 

The women teachers whose cause you have so long and so 
ably advocated. Miss Strachan, have special claims, in my opin- 
ion, in the controversy that will never be settled till it is settled 
right. Personally, however, I prefer to argue on the one line 
herebefore mentioned — " Equal Pay." The very shibboleth is con- 
clusive of all discussion. 

JAMES S. H. UMSTED. 

"EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK" 

A reply to a circular entitled " Equal Pay For Equal Work " 
which male teachers had distributed outside Cooper Union on 
the occasion of our mass meeting, January 30, 1908. 

By Miss Lina E. Gano, Manhattan Vice-President, Interbor- 
ough Association of Women Teachers. 

" The laborer is worthy of his hire." — Luke, X-7. 

Many women are laborers; "so recognized by our statutes, 
and firmly so established by consent " of modern society, their 
male relatives and shifting economic conditions. 

Because of peculiar adaptations woman has found her 
" natural and advantageous sphere of effort in activities " asso- 
ciated with the training and education of youth. Because of 
peculiar economi_c_and social conditions of modern life, many 
women have found this " natural sphere of effort in activities 
beyond the threshold of the home." 

" Money in the form of salary, wages, etc., also as the price 
of marketable products, is, after all, but the mere convenience 
of civilization by which mankind " and womankind " may easily 
interchange their peculiar individual products or benefits for 
desirable necessities or benefits held by others." 

The above facts are some of the fundamental truths in our 
social and economic systems. 

The family is one of several social units recognized by promi- 
nent authorities. See Gidding's Historical Sociology. Seventy- 
five per cent, of the women teachers of New York City find 
themselves the heads of families which they have inherited. 
For the support and maintenance of said families they are 
forced to pay the full market price for foods, shelter, clothing, 
transportation, physician's services, amusements, etc. 

The family in ancient Greece and Rome was probably the 
economic unit. The wife, the children and all other property 
constituted the family wealth — oikos. This' is no longer true. 
The fact that women are recognized as independent units in 
the industrial world, with independent responsibilities, proves the 
failure of the acient scheme under modern conditions. 

The statutes of the State of New York recognize the man and 
the woman as separate economic units even when they are one 



492 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

in marriage. The married woman has the right to her own 
earnings and to her own inherited wealth. Married or single, 
the woman may make contracts and be held responsible for the 
same under statute law governing similar transactions in any 
case. She may buy or sell in the open market of the City, the 
State, or the Nation, and enjoy all the protection and immuni- 
ties of property accorded to other citizens. She is also forced 
to recognize the duties and responsibilities of other property 
owners. She may hold real estate in her own right and must 
pay her full pro-rata of taxes for state and local protection. 
She may enter any service or profession for which she is 
eligible without hindrance or discrimination of statute law, ex- 
cept that of teaching the youth of the State. 

By the Constitution, the women of the State of New York 
are recognized as citizens, or political units; by statute law they 
are recognized as industrial and economic units. To confuse 
ancient and mediaeval economic standards with modern stand- 
ards, or to confuse social units with industrial units is either 
the result of ignorance or perversion. 

" The more clearly we look into the daily lives, habits and 
occupations of the great mass of society, that in some form or 
other is obliged to work for and earn its own living, the more 
clearly do we perceive that the so-called work" of the individ- 
ual is the combined work of the individual and those who min- 
ister to the individual's necessities. "The wife prepares meals 
and helps in maintaining the home of the husband " ; the woman 
who goes out into the working world must trust the same to 
servants, often careless, extravagant and incompetent. 

The wages of an individual, then, should be the wages fitted 
to the requirements for the service, the results of the service 
and the supply of said individuals in the open market. For any 
class in any service to ask or petition for more is to ask for 
special protection and consideration from society. It is a 
pitiful exhibition on the part of those claiming the protection 
and an unjust 'reflection upon others of the same class who are 
ready to meet the conditions. Granting the special protection, 
forces the employer, the City or State of New York, into the 
attitude of an eleemosynary institution. To the credit of 
American manhood and our civil administration it is fair to say 
that there is but one department of the public service of the 
City of New York where discrimination in favor of men as 
against women is asked. It is also fair to state that the eco- 
nomic standards of every profession except that of teaching, 
are measured by conditions of to-day as opposed to those of 
Ancient Rome and Mediaeval Europe. This may perhaps ac- 
count for the measure of contempt sometimes felt for the 
teaching service, by those who know and recognize that eco- 
nomics is a " shifting science." 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 493 

When, therefore, a woman, often charged with a home and 
always contributing to the life of the nation, enters the indus- 
trial field, she is entitled to the compensation of other individ- 
uals in the same field. She is entitled to the same pay as the 
man whose just wage is what he is worth. It is right that she 
should receive as much as any other employee, meeting the 
same requirements and producing equivalent results, particularly 
when we remember the helpless members of her family or the 
incompetent servants upon whom she must depend for necessi- 
ties. 

The pay that men teachers receive by the existing schedule 
is certainly not extravagant, but compared with women gives 
them in many cases double pay for the same work. 

These considerations are in distinct contradiction to the re- 
quirements of the civil service system in every other depart- 
ment of the City or State service. Any legislation that con- 
tinues these discriminations and " inflicts arbitrary, artificial and 
unnatural conditions " in economic life, is not in the interest 
of justice or equity, but in the interest of a special class. It 
is class legislation of the grossest type. 

The demand for unequal pay by men teachers is based upon 
the mistaken notion that woman is not yet an entity, and ignor- 
ing the fact that the Constitution and statute law have recog- 
nized her as such in making her a political and industrial unit 
with accompanying responsibilities. 

When the wife made the cloth and the clothes, knit the 
stockings and the gloves, brewed the ale, made the cheese, the 
butter and the bread for the family, cured the meats and all 
table delicacies, and combined the qualifications of a teacher 
with those of a physician, and when the husband provided the 
shelter and contributed the raw materials for all of his so- 
called natural dependents, the family was an economic unit. 
But conditions have changed. 

This work is now done outside the home by women as well 
as men who are skilled in the various industries and profes- 
sions. Each of these individuals has his or her own burdens 
and problems as an individual. Each receives a renumeration 
as an individual. The woman does very much the same kind of 
work as before, only the ways of doing the work and the 
methods of remuneration have changed. In other words, society 
has come to recognize the woman and the man as individuals 
and as economic units rather than parts of units. Each individ- 
ual comes very near living an individual life but with certain 
obligations to render to dependents and to the great social 
structure. Women as well as men have become bread winners 
and have been forced to assume the responsibilities and obliga- 
tions formerly assumed by the so-called heads of families. In 
some industries and several professions there is no discrimina- 



494 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

tion against women if the service rendered is satisfactory, but' 
in the teaching profession many localities make a discrimination 
varying from 30 per cent, to 50 per cent, because of sex and 
no corresponding discrimination in their favor from landlords, 
grocers, public service corporations, etc. 

These social and economic conditions have come in spite of 
any theories that we may individually entertain. As Professor 
Farnum, of Yale, has recently said, " We are living in a highly 
dynamic period. We are so accustomed to change that we 
sometimes do not realize all that it means or the rate of the 
change of the present day." But the family as an economic 
unit has passed. In the industrial and commercial world, per- 
sons are paid for efficiency of service. Salaries and wages are 
not determined by the size of families. 

Systems of economics also reflect these changes. Each his- 
toric period has had some economic ideal which passed for a 
law in its time. In the Feudal period society was wedded to 
the theory that the economic status of every class was measured 
by its relation to the land. Legislation was class legislation 
and reflected the position of the classes to landed estates. But 
in turn many of these ideas and ideals were outgrown. The 
Davis Law, however, which fixes the salaries of teachers in the 
City of New York is a relic of this mediaeval class legis- 
lation. 

By this law, men secured protection which removed them and 
their services from the open market and fixed a wage for a class 
from 30 per cent, to 60 per cent, greater than for another class 
(women) for whom they also legislated. 

After the Feudal theories came the theory of government 
control and government interference in all industrial and com- 
mercial enterprises, as evidenced in France and England for 
two or more centuries before the French Revolution. Again 
the economic, political and legislative ideas went hand in hand 
until they were overthrown by one of the most notable struggles 
in history. 

Then gradually came freedom from government control, free- 
dom for labor, freedom to combine and in time freedom for 
trade and the announcement that the " law of supply and de- 
mand " would at last settle the economic questions of the world. 
It was thought that John Stuart Mill had said the last word 
on the subject of competition. When Bagehot doubted whether 
competition always worked perfectly and when Walker dared 
to advocate governmental interference in industry, they were 
consigned to the place from which we all hope to escape. But 
as President Hadley of Yale has recently said, " Modern eco- 
nomics as a science is being freed from the remorseless logic of 
John Stuart Mill. Even this system is passing. The old 




Hon. Mirabeau L. Towns^ 
Chairman, Caknegie Hall Mass Meeting, December 17, 1909. 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 495 

economic orthodoxy is gone, and may I add, no one knows this 
better than American men. The doctrine of supply and demand 
is not accepted by society. Our American financial system is a 
verjr definite protest against the logic of a few economists 
whose teachings American men have never heeded. Then why 
quote this antiquated doctrine to women and ask them to con- 
form to a theory that society has overthrown for men. Pro- 
fessor Dewey, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 
in his Presidential address before the American Economic Asso- 
ciation, made a plea for more accurate and scientific observa- 
tion of facts before any theory of economics could be established 
with justice and intelligence for all. He insisted upon the 
futility of teaching theory while there is no unanimity as to 
the facts upon which these theories are based. For example, 
exactly opposite statements were made concerning the panic 
of 1907, by eminent authorities. In the remorseless theory of 
supply and demand not all of the facts are known — the theory 
is based upon partial knowledge. In fact, no economic theorj^ 
is yet to be trusted. There is much propaganda for the sake 
of promoting the theory of some interested party or parties. 

But at last men have come to realize that for men compe- 
tition is not merely a struggle for existence. They insist that 
for men, at least, society shall draw up the rules of the game 
and hence by organization, agitation and legislation they are 
able to escape the bitter theory of supply and demand. Society 
must establish social justice. New ideas of justice and equality 
are being recognized. A new economic philosophy must be 
formulated and women bearing the burdens of men and rend- 
ering to society a service equally valuable must not be asked 
to conform to an economic code, that the other half of the race 
has outgrown, 

LINA E. GANO, 
Manhattan Vice-President, 
Interborough Association Women Teachers. 

I have made some inquiries as to the attitude of universities 
in the matter of salaries paid to women instructors. The ques- 
tion does not come up here at Cornell, where the instructing 
staflf, with a single exception, is made up of men, but so far as 
I have been able to learn in universities where both men and 
women are eligible for appointment " the salary paid goes with 
the grade of the position, and is not subject to variation by 
reason of sex." Cornell does appoint freely women to fellow- 
ships, and I have never heard a suggestion that the income paid 
should be made to vary with the sex of the incumbent. 

I am not so well informed as I should like to be concerning 
particular local conditions which you face, but as regards the 



496 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

general principle that the position should determine the salary, 
I am in hearty accord with j^ou. 

GEORGE P. BRISTOL, 
Jan. i6, 1908. Director, Summer Session, 

To Miss Lina E. Gano. Cornell University. 

My sympathies are and always have been with you in your 
great movement for right and justice — for Equal Pay for Equal 
Work, which is really a self-evident principle. The only argu- 
ments against it are expediency and an " economy which 
squanders." 

THOMAS HUNTER, 
President Emeritus, Normal College. 

I am with you in the great work. 

WILLIAM HARKNESS, 

Ex-Member, Board of Education. 

As to the matter in general, I do believe in equal pay for 
equal work. I think, however, that the whole situation as re- 
gards the schools and the economic conditions of the city is 
not a simple but a complex problem, and I am not yet ready 
at this time to express an opinion either pro or con with re- 
gard to any particular line of action. I should want to investi- 
gate it very carefully and take counsel of men and women m 
whose judgment I rely. 

Sincerely yours, 

Feb. 6, 1908. CHARLES SPRAGUE SMITH. 

My Dear Miss Strachan — Yovi are doubtless aware of the 
fact that I have resigned from the Board of Education, my 
resignation to take effect March i. I had intended to resign 
in January, but wished to remain long enough to vote upon and 
place myself on record as in favor of Mr. Soniers' resolution. 
By dating my resignation as far ahead as March i, when I sent 
it to the Mayor in January, I thought I should have ample 
time for the resolution to be acted on, but Mr. Somers' absence 
has unexpectedly postponed action. 

I wish to assure you that I keenly regret my inability to 
avail myself of the privilege and the honor of recording myself 
with the progressive minority of the board, and I desire again 
to emphasize my unequivocal position in favor of the principle 
of equal pay for men and women teachers who perform the 
same work. 

I have found it necessary to resign for the reason that I could 
not afford to give the time required for conscientious perform- 
ance of the work of the board. My one cause for anxiety now 
is that those who do not know me well may possibly class me 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 497 

Math the non-progressive element which still entertains the 
ideas and habit of mind of more than a half century ago. 

I shall esteem it a favor if you will let my position be freely 
known, in any way and through any medium that you may 
deem advisable. The cause with which you are so prominently 
and unselfishl}^ identified is absolutely certain to be victorious 
and you have the satisfaction of knowing that those in oppo- 
sition are fighting a losing battle, for the reason that they are 
fighting against the inevitable progress of civilized ideas and 
the perfectly clear and well-defined trend of future progress. 

With great respect, 
Very truly yours, 
(Signed) ARTHUR HOLLIC?C. 

I never have understood why persons should not receive pay 
without regard to sex for the same work and service. We 
make no discrimination in Syracuse University becavTse of sex, 
either in the privileges of the students or in the salaries of 
any employed. In our College of Fine Arts we have a number 
of women on the faculty. 

Very truly yours, 
JAMES R. DAY, 
Chancellor, Syracuse University. 

You have had my fullest sympathy in your fight for the 
cause of right and justice from the first, and you can rely on 
my support till the end, which I have no doubt will be victory. 
I have given careful attention to the controversy, and have 
failed to find a single logical argument against your reasonable 
demands. 

It is a pleasure to find our most intellectual men now rang- 
ing themselves upon your side. 

JOSEPH HETHERINGTON, 

Dec, 1909. Chairman, Local School Board, District 42. 

I have always believed that whenever a woman does the same 
work as a man and does it equally well, she should receive a 
man's wages. This is a general principle. 

(Signed) CHAS. R. SKINNER, 

Ex-Member Congress; formerly Supt. Public 
Instruction, State of New York; Ex-Pres., 
National Association of Teachers. 
March 24, 1908. 

I believe heartily in the general principle of equal pay for 
equal work. I believe further, that women teachers in the 
City of New York should, in general, receive more pay than 
they are at present receiving, but I am not able, as yet at least, 



498 EQUAL PAY. TOR EQUAL WORK 

to give assent to the principle of " equal pay " for teachers as 
that principle is now interpreted. 

WALTER L. HERVEY, 
Dec. 19, 1909. The Board of Examiners, 

Dept. of Education, New York. 

Salaries should be adjusted — not on a physiological basis, but 
on a pedagogical one. The Board of Education has said that 
women are eligible to the positions of principals and assistant 
principal. To pay different salaries to incumbents of the same 
positions is to employ teachers as farmers employ their help — 
half a man (a boy), half pay. Or as sailors are employed 
"able-bodied" men and "ordinary" sailors. 

2d. — A woman principal gets a maximum salary of $2500 and 
is responsible for the work of the entire school, while a man 
teacher in her school with a class of 30 to 35 pupils is paid 
$2400. 

Is it possible that $100 difference is consistent? 

An assistant principal gets a maximum of $1600 and shares 
the principal's responsibility for the school, while a man teacher 
with a class of 30 to 35 whom she supervises, is paid $2400. 
Is it consistent to pay a supervisor $800 less than a subordi- 
nate? 

Both a principal and an assistant principal must have su- 
perior qualifications, and prove those qualifications by a pro- 
fessional examination — such examination being wholly peda- 
gogical and not physiological. 

These two positions are used as illustrations of every other. 

M. H. BARTLETT. 

We extend our hearty endorsement. We employ a number 
of teachers in our school and reward them for their services 
according to their ability and regardless of sex. We believe 
a woman teacher is a more important factor than a man teacher 
in the educational field. Naturally, her sympathies are nearer 
the hearthstone and she Is more patient; therefore, her influence 
with children has a greater tendency to aid in training the 
young mind. With these advantages, she is equal to or greater 
than the man. A woman in her effort to support herself de- 
serves and should have, at all times, the support of the sterner 

ESTEY AND GARDNER, 
Merchants and Bankers School, New York. 

* * * I am, however, in accord with the principle that the 
position filled should have a salary fixed without regard to the 



-EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 499 

sex of the holder, provided that the logical consequences of this 
doctrine be accepted, to wit, that equal pay demands equal 
work in every respect and equal responsibility. 

F. C. BYRNES, 
Jan. 30, 1908. Board of Examiners, 

Department of Education, 
New York. 

Ever since the Interborough Association of Women Teach- 
ers commenced their campaign for " Equal Pay for Equal 
Work," I have been much interested in the movement, for it 
seemed to me in every way worthy of the considerate and 
favorable attention of the school authorities, as well as of the 
people of this great City, and if the demands of my professional 
life had not been so insistent and exhaustive, I would have been 
glad to have added my voice and my efforts (feeble though 
they might have been) in furthering such a just cause. 

I am not speaking particularly of any of the details of the 
plans proposed by your Association, or by some of its friends, 
but of " the general principle which it seems to me is thoroughly 
in accord with that other and equally true principle ' a square 
deal.' " 

I wish your Association all success in its eliforts in behalf of 
the women teachers of this City, for I believe they will not 
only benefit the women teachers, but the men teachers as 
well, and above and beyond all individuals, that great system 
which is the bulwark of our free institutions. 

Faithfully yours, 

HENRY N. TIFFT. 

March 3, 1908. Lawyer and Ex-President, 

Board of Education. 

Do you know that Horace Mann said he "would as soon place 
an elephant to brooding chickens as he would a man to teach little 
children " ? 

I endorse the above. As " the workman is worthy of his 
hire," let the women's salaries be commensurate with work 
accomplished, but do not pull down the salaries of the men to 
equalize. 

Yours sincerely, 

Feb. 25, 1907. I. B. POUCHER, A. M., Pd. D., 

Principal, State Normal and Training School. 

Hon. Member of Assembly, 
My Dear Mr. Lee: 
Your reason for not favoring the Equal Pay Bill, viz., " The 



Soo EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

city cannot afford it this year," sets me wondering- if you really 
know what it really will cost — or, are you depending upon the men 
for your estimate? 

If so, I beg to state you are laboring under a very false im- 
pression. 

Our leader, Miss Strachan, formerly head teacher of mathe- 
matics in the Brooklyn Training School, has proved con- 
clusively, using city records, that the extra mill tax will aggre- 
gate a sum of over six millions of dollars. 

This is ample to meet the requirements of the bill. 

Perhaps you feel that the individual taxpayer cannot afford 
it. Has he said so? 

Assuredly not. Consider, if you will, the weighty signifi- 
cance of the many boards of trade, tax-payers' associations, dry 
goods establishments, labor unions, clubs, noted men and 
women — not to mention the thousands and thousands of signa- 
tures willingly given by taxpayers throughout the entire city — ■ 
that have signified their loyal support to this most worthy 
cause. 

Does not all this forcibly manifest the desire of the people 
to pay cheerfully, in the cause of justice, the cost, each year, 
say of a few theater or opera tickets? 

" Taxation without representation is tyranny." 

Taxation with representation unheeding the demands of the 
people is, well, what is it? Better or worse than tyranny? 

Let us consider for a moment the unit of the state — the 
family. 

If a dear one is stricken with some serious physical illness, 
what is it we immediately do, no matter how humble the cir- 
cumstances or how empty the purse? 

We hail the very best physician, employ a high-salaried 
nurse, purchase expensive medicines, follow this, in many cases, 
with consultations, operations, and health-seeking journeys, 
realizing that no effort or expense is too great to restore health. 

If it be a mental disease the same course is pursued. 

How about an insidious moral disease like injustice? Is not 
prompt and efficient treatment of vital importance here also? 

Surely the representatives of the largest city of the new 
world, and the leading state of the Union, should set the ex- 
ample, and once having had their eyes opened to the " glaring 
inequalities " that have existed for some eight years in the pay- 
ment of the city's and state's best servants — the teachers, — 
proceed to put a speedy end to such conditions. 

Countless centuries — aye, back even as far as Plato — have 
proved beyond question that the corner stone of every true 
and lasting republic is justice. 

Mar. 26, 1908. ANNA L. McGUIRE. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 501 



THE EQUAL PAY QUESTION 

Miss Jeliffe of the Girls' High School Presents Logical Arguments 
on Behalf of Her Sex 

To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle: 

Women are employed in the public school system of Greater 
New York in numbers overwhelming as compared with the 
number of men. There are three possible causes for this: 
First, they are better teachers; second, it costs the city less to 
employ them; third, they are more willing to enter a profession 
in which the amount of work, the amount of drudgery, the 
amount of monotony is so large compared with resulting emol- 
ument and renown. 

The first hypothesis is a debatable one. It is probable that 
the capacities of men and women as regards teaching balance 
very fairly, except in the matter of patience and willingness 
to dwell on detailed drill work. In this last, I think, it will be 
generally considered that women excel. 

The second reason is manifestly true at present. Now, if 
there is no choice between the teaching capacities of men and 
women, then the pay should not show partiality. If New York 
feels, on the other hand, that men are better teachers, then the 
Board of Education, despite the enormous appropriation of city 
funds, is supplying an inferior article to the people of New 
York City on the ground of cheapness. Surely New York City 
should object to this. If the city is, however, satisfied with 
the quality of the work and with the results obtained by the 
present educational force, should it not then, in justice, pay that 
force what it considers the fair wage in the case of a man? 
Fully as many women now have to be supporting factors in 
families as do men. Only less satisfactory work on their part 
should, therefore, occasion less satisfactory pay. 

In the third place, the Board of Education employs more 
women, partly because more women fit themselves for this pro- 
fession. This state of affairs would seem to indicate that men 
are not so much drawn to the profession as women are. They 
are not drawn to it, possibly, because thej- feel in themselves 
no fitness for it, or because it is a badly paid profession, or 
because it offers no resulting renown comparable to work re- 
quired. 

Suppose the first reason to be the true reason; then women 
are granted as superior teachers, and should receive superior, 
not inferior, pay. Suppose the second reason be true: then 
surely the woman has a right to complain, for she is worse 
paid than the man. If, however, the third reason be the cor- 



S02 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

rect one, then a woman who willingly undergoes the work, and 
foregoes the renown, should at least get material compensation 
adequate to her efforts; and she asks not for pay superior to 
a man's, but simply equal to his. 

It would seem, then, that the question is reduced to the fol- 
lowing: Since men do not willingly enter the profession, either 
from lack of capacity or because the emolument and renown 
are not sufficient to be tempting, and since the burden of edu- 
cation — the factor acknowledged as most potent in modern 
civilization — is left on the shoulders of the women teachers. 
New York City should feel it simple justice to pay said women 
teachers a wage equal to that which she would consider as 
fair for a man. 

ELIZABETH M. JELIFFE. 

Girls' High School, Brooklyn, May 14, 1907. 

Dear Senator Grady. 

As principal for nearly thirteen years of one of the largest 
grammar schools for boys in Manhattan, and as a public school 
teacher for nearly double that period, permit me to address 
3^ou in reference to the bill for the equalization of salaries of 
school teachers. 

According to the reports published in this morning's news- 
papers, a large meeting of male principals and male teachers 
was held yesterday for the purpose of voicing their opposition 
to the bill. One of the points presented in the series of reso- 
lutions introduced and adopted at this meeting was that in 
Germany, 88 per cent, of the teachers were males, and in 
France, 60 per cent, of the teachers were males. Where women 
are concerned, Germany and France are hardly the standards 
to present to an American community. Yet it was certainly 
in keeping with the selfish, unmanly, boorish spirit which ac- 
tuated these male teachers and male principals, that such a 
comparison should be made. Anyone at all conversant with 
the status of Woman in the countries named, might well be 
astonished that women are permitted to have any place at all 
in the schools. It must certainly be taken as a great conces- 
sion, or condescension, that women should be permitted to 
have any hand in the school-training of German or French 
boys and girls. 

Another point upon which particular stress was laid at this 
meeting of male principals and male teachers, was the effemin- 
ization of the schools, a most terrible calamity threatening the 
whole school system of the Greater New York. This dread 
disease has been hinted at elsewhere and recently; but whether 
as a playful euphemism, or as a cloak to hide some real con- 
ditions of decay in our school system, deponent sayeth not. 
It must be admitted that there are symptoms of decay, symp- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 503 

toms which have been apparent for years back; but while your 
male teachers and your male principals say it is too much 
Woman in the schools, there are Men Teachers and Men Prin- 
cipals — and others — who aver that the marking system has let 
loose upon the schools a horde of mollycoddles who will reel 
off pedagogics and psychology by the yard, but are as soft as 
putty in the hands of the ordinary New York school-boy. 

Of thirty-two teachers in my school, twenty-one are Women. 
Among these women are a dozen who are the equals of any 
dozen male teachers in the system, and are vastly superior to 
a dozen dozen of the bunch of male teachers who exploited 
themselves yesterday so uproariously. 

If a woman will do as efifective work as a man will do, she 
should be paid a wage equal to the wage paid to the man. 
This principle is already recognized in two departments of the 
Board of Education, in direct contradiction to a statement by 
Dr. Conroy. There are three women District Superintendents, 
each of whom is getting a salary similar to the salary of the 
men District Superintendents. In the Truancy Department are 
six women Attendance Officers, each of whom is getting a 
salary equal to the salary of any of the men Attendance Officers. 

So there you are. 

Pay for Service, not pay for Sex. 

You are at liberty to make such use of this letter as you see 
fit. 

JOSEPH J. CASEY. 

Hon. George B. McClellan, 

Mayor of the City of New York. 

* * * If I convey the idea from what I have written that 
women teachers can do the work that men teachers do, and do 
it equally as well — a doctrine that I firmly believe and have 
always believed — it is not for the purpose of having you fall 
in with that idea, but to accept it as an axiom and to apply it to 
the principle — pay for service, not pay for sex. 

I think you are broad minded enough to accept the principle. 
The question of salary, therefore, becomes an ethical one which 
should not be measured by dollars and cents " Fiat justitia, ruat 
coelum " cannot find an apter application than here. 

In conclusion permit me to say that I am Principal of Public 
School 83 in East iioth Street, with a corps of thirty-two teach- 
ers, twenty-one of whom are women. I have, therefore, reason 
and experience for everything I have written. 

JOSEPH J. CASEY. 

May, 1909. 

I wish you God-speed in your efforts for " Equal pay for 
Equal work." I have been with women in the public schools— 



504 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL IVORK 

whose influences were soothing, refining, uplifting; under whose 
inspiration, noble characters were formed or developed. Per- 
haps it was my fortune to have been among such women, 
I have been with men, gross, treacherous, shallow, whose influences 
tended to stunt the moral growth — moral, in its broadest sense — • 
of the sensitive natures entrusted to their moulding. Perhaps it 
was my mishap to have been among such men. We form our 
judgments according to our experiences, and my experiences, reach- 
ing back longer than you might care to know, are responsible for 
my adhesion to your cause. Very respectfully yours, 
April 6, 1910. JOSEPH J. CASEY. 



CALIFORNIA SCHOOL TEACHERS 

To the Editor of The Sun—Sir : " Poor little New York," as a 
Los Angeles paper recently called the metropolis, was never known 
(according to an eastern publication) to originate a reform nor an 
improvement of importance. She does, however, sometimes adopt 
the more advanced ideas of other cities and " go them one better," 
enlarging upon them with all the resources at her command. 

Just now she is suffering throes of anguish over the school salary 
question, that was settled long ago, peaceably, fairly and with no 
wild cries from a public about to be ruined, by the laws of one of 
the younger States of the Union. 

When I went to California to live, in 1878, I found that three 
grades of certificates were issued by the State to teachers, after 
rigorous examination, and each grade commanded a fixed salary. 
It made no difference whether the teacher was male or female, 
each position had its allotted pay, and could be secured by any one 
duly qualified. The schools of that far-away State were then 
ranked among the best in this country, and they have kept pace 
with the times. There has been no worrying about " lack of mas- 
culine influence on the growing boy," no injury to men teachers, 
no inordinate taxation; in fact, the arrangement has always been 
accepted as a matter of course, with that broad and generous treat- 
ment of women which is characteristic of western communities, 
and it amuses Californians now to read of the tempest, the dire 
forebodings aroused by an effort to accomplish, in the greatest city 
of the United States, what is to them a thing scarcely admitting 
of argument. 

" Poor little New York " indeed ! " Poor " in her professed in- 
ability to " meet the expense." " Little " in her frantic clinging to 
rulings of a bygone era. Can't she brush down the cobwebs, 
broaden her mental horizon and keep step with the progressive 
people of this twentieth century ?— Clara S. Ellis, New York, May 
9, 1907. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 505 



SUPPLY AND DEMAND IN EDUCATION 

It might be suggested to Mr. Edgar L. Levey, whose recent let- 
ter to the New York Sun was quoted at length in the Educational 
Reviezu for February, that neither abuse of one's opponents nor 
dogmatic assertion constitutes argument. Perhaps the " grotesque 
propaganda " of the women teachers " excites disgust," perhaps 
their supporters are guilty of " opportune sycophancy," the tax- 
payers of " flaccid indifference," the public of " stupid unconcern," 
but no set of people who are whole-heartedly convinced of the 
justice of their cause may be denominated " hypocrites " — except, 
of course, in a Levitical sense. 

" The Interborough Association of Women Teachers," says Mr. 
Levey, " would have the city ignore the law of supply and demand. 
Shall this law also be ignored in all the other city departments in 
the fixing of salaries? Shall it also be ignored in the purchase of 
materials and supplies? What limit, if any, shall be set to this 
new standard of privilege which is to turn our bureaucracy into a 
veritable aristrocracy ? " 

In this statement Mr. Levey compares things which are not 
comparable — rather an elementary mistake in logic. The years of 
special training required of teachers, as well as the exacting and, 
the old-fashioned among us still think, holy nature of their work, 
would seem to put them in a different class from the unskilled 
laborers employed by the city — snow-shovelers, for example. Nor 
can they be lumped with " materials and supplies " any more than 
you can multiply nights by cats and get eternal bliss. 

The law of supply and demand, the fetish of commercialists in 
education, is continually being modified or even set aside in its 
own particular domain, that of trade. Sweat-shop labor is cheap, 
the commodities produced by it may be obtained at a ridiculously 
low price, and yet there are many persons who cheerfully pay more 
for the same article out of considerations of humanity, or, perhaps, 
dread of infectious disease. Child labor is cheap and the supply 
on the increase, but the statutes of many states make its use 
illegal. There is, too, even in the world of trade, such a thing as 
ultimate gain to be set over against the immediate receipt of dollars 
and cents. And so, shorter working hours, sanitary conditions 
in workrooms, holidays, have come to modify the rigidity of the 
law of supply and demand. 

In so complex a matter as education the rigidity of the law 
must be still further modified. Why is a Sabbatical year given in 
many colleges? Plenty of professors could be obtained to work 
year in and year out with long hours and large classes, until they 
degenerated into mechanical drudges. But here the college admin- 
istration is wise and sees that leisure for travel, wider reading, 
periods of uninterrupted research increase a teacher's worth and 



5o6 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

so benefit the college. Nor would the city " violate the specific 
pledge of trusteeship toward its taxpayers proclaimed in the 
charter " if it were to increase the salaries of its women teachers 
so that they might be enabled to secure more of the daily com- 
forts of life than a hall bedroom implies and make reasonable 
provision for old age. 

As to Mr. Levey's hint — evidently thrown in for good measure — ■ 
that women teachers use a large part of their salary for " mere 
pin money," the present writer showed in a letter to the Evening 
Post, dated, February 20, igo8, that in one of the city high schools 
ninety-one per cent, of the women had one or more persons de- 
pendent upon her, either wholly or in part. In most cases it was 
an aged father or mother, in some the education of younger 
brothers or sisters. One woman held herself largely responsible 
for the five children of a dead brother, and another took entire 
care of a bed-ridden mother and aged aunt. Nor, as was there 
said, is this outlay in the nature of an investment (unless it be 
treasure in heaven). A man looks to his children for support in 
old age, but those for whom a woman cares — for the most part — 
will be gone when she is old and needs help. 

" If," says Mr. Levey, " women in the public schools can properly 
perform all the functions of men at a smaller wage, then in the 
interest of honest and economical government by all means get rid 
of the men. But this is not claimed." It is precisely what is 
claimed and all that is claimed. Otherwise, " Equal Pay for 
Equal Work " would be the fallacy Mr. Levey calls it. Women 
are doing the same grade of work as men and are doing it as 
satisfactorily. They are doing as much work, in some cases even 
more (see a letter by the present writer, also to the Evening Post, 
dated December 14, 1908). Nor was there ever any question of 
their equal or superior fitness until the matter came to be one of 
dollars and cents. It is, therefore, a violation of the law of 
supply and demand to have any men teachers in the public schools. 
Why are they there? Because, contrary to the law of supply and 
demand, it is thought that the influence of men, at least some men, 
is needed in education, and also — this is never omitted — they are 
needed to superintend athletics, which, by the way, could be looked 
after much better by a paid coach. 

In conclusion we are told that for the city " to yield to these 
demands (of the women teachers) means an immense obstacle to 
the solution of its many pressing problems of civic progress and 
development." This would be serious if it were true. Two 
measures of relief suggest themselves : first, instead of putting up 
more school buildings at an enormous cost and packing children 
into them like sardines to justify the expense, smaller and less ex- 
pensive buildings might be put up, or buildings already standing 
might be bought and turned into schoolrooms. It does not take 
much fitting up to make a schoolroom, given a real teacher, a 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 507 

class of children, and a blackboard, if, that is to say, education is 
the primary object in view and not the creation of huge educa- 
tional machines too large for one man to handle. Second, and this 
is a hard saying, if sinecures held by politicians (like Cicero, 
nomina non nomino) were lopped off; if appropriations, repairs, 
and supplies were lifted out of the realm of farce; as, for in- 
stance, certain Windsor chairs worth about sixty cents, for which 
the city paid twenty-two dollars and a half each ; if, in a word, 
the interests of taxpayers were protected against graft, " honest " 
and otherwise, the city would save enough money to meet, and 
more than meet, the just demands of the women teachers. Here 
is a possibility of " civic progress and development," and, at the 
present writing, it almost seems as though it were going to be 
realized. ELIZABETH DU BOIS PECK. 



PROFESSION OR "JOB." 

To the Editor of The Evening Post — Sir: A few years ago 
teaching was, at least occasionally, spoken of as a profession, and 
its members compared, in respect to income, with ministers, doctors, 
lawyers, or artists. In all of these last-named professions women 
come into competition with men to a greater or less extent. Men 
have the advantage of custom and of numbers, but, in the last 
analysis, income is dependent on the training, experience, and 
skill, not at all on sex. Last spring a writer in the Evening Post 
gave a long table in which the " wage " of teachers was com- 
pared with that of clerks, stenographers, paper-box makers, and 
others. With no disparagement to these occupations, it seems 
economically sound to argue that the special training required of 
the teacher should put his calling upon a somewhat higher plane, 
and make such comparisons inappropriate. 

Now, in the issue of the Evening Post for February 17 I read 
this statement, signed E. S. S. : " Economic law and the well-be- 
ing of society set the wage of the adult male at the ' living wage ' 
of the family — this quite regardless whether the individual man is 
even married." That is to say, society owes every " adult male," 
no matter how ignorant, no matter how dull, no matter how de- 
praved, every " adult male," enough money to support a family — 
even if he has no family. I do not so understand economic law. 
The work of the world comes, in the long run, into the hands of 
those who can do it best. This is true from the philosopher and 
inventor, at one end of the line, to the coal-heaver at the other. 
The more highly specialized the work is, the more it depends on 
fitness alone. Here is the reason that E. S. S. and those like him 
are anxious to be classed with stenographers and box-makers, 
rather than physicians or writers. We can see that in making a 
paper box the fact that a man is a father might have weight, as it 



5o8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

would not in operating for appendicitis, for instance, or writing 
an article on high finance. 

The question of equal pay has been argued again and again, 
logically, economically, sometimes even politely. But all the di- 
verse arguments reduce themselves to just two propositions. The 
first is, Are women as fit in every way as men, for the position 
of teacher in the public schools? and the second, Granted their 
equal fitness, is it economically sound to make their salaries equal? 

(1) Woman's equal fitness as a teacher was not seriously ques- 
tioned by the male members of the profession until it became a 
matter of dollars and cents. Men teachers sat in their classrooms, 
in the good old days, and read the morning paper; in difficult 
cases of discipline, they called on the woman in the next room 
for aid, or resorted to corporal punishment, sometimes even dis- 
tressingly severe (I am not giving imaginary instances). Again, 
a serious comparison of the results of examinations in classes 
of the same grade taught by men and by women has always 
shown equal intellectual fitness on the part of the women. And 
the children themselves have paid as much respect to their women 
as to their men teachers. This is important. Children know 
whether a teacher is just, sincere, and interested in their welfare, 
or the reverse. They are even shrewder judges of ability and 
character than their elders. 

For the last few months I have never heard the subject of 
equal pay argued to a finish but the male disputant, beaten by 
facts and statistics from one outpost of argument to another, 
at last took refuge in athletics. Women may be able to teach 
mathematics, English, Latin, but where are they in athletics? 
" Down and out." And what are mathematics, English amd Latin 
in comparison with athletics? It is that their children may be- 
come proficient in shooting, football, and cross-country running 
that the taxpayers of this city foot the enormous school bills. 

(2) Is it economically sound to make the salaries equal? Here 
is where the " family " comes in. Is a man, because he has a 
family, or may have a family, to receive money for that family 
rather than for his services? The statement has been made that 
80 per cent, of the men teachers in the high schools of this city 
are married. In one of the high schools (for which the statis- 
tics are at hand), the number of women with some family obli- 
gation is 91 per cent. " That is as it should be," says E. S. S. 
" A single woman should be productive to society as well as self- 
supporting." " A single woman " — " ah, there's the rub ! " But I 
have known instances in which the duty of supporting an aged 
father or mother stood in the way of a woman's marriage, while 
her brother, so fortunate as to be an " adult male," had married 
and was raising the aforesaid " family." Again, as has been 
said, a man looks to his children for support in old age; the 
money he spends on them is an investment for the future, while 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 509 

those for whom a woman cares — for the most part — will be gone 
when she is old and needs help. . . . 

Finally, although the " gross inequalities " in the salaries of 
men and women teachers are well known, perhaps it is not so 
well known that when a vacancy is to be filled or a first appoint- 
ment made to one of the higher positions, a man is selected even 
for a girls' school (where there are no athletics) though a 
woman may precede him on the eligible list, may have been wait- 
ing longer, etc., etc. As a case in point, five years ago next 
June, the present writer received a first assistant's license along 
with two men and two other women. After four years, when one 
man had been appointed and the other refused to take a position 
offered, but none of the women appointed, a second examination 
in the subject was held, to which men only were admitted, and 
of the nine men who qualified, all but one were appointed before 
the first woman from the previous list, although she stood sec- 
ond on that list, received an appointment. 

The case of the men teachers seems from first to last a piece 
of special pleading. What if they lack knowledge of their subject, 
ability to make all clear, a high sense of honor — they are fathers, 
or may be. This is taking the city's money tmder false pretences. 
Just as between a man and a woman physician, income from 
practice is a matter of special fitness, so it should be between 
the man and woman teacher. Let this fitness be discovered by 
examinations, oral and written, by tests of character, by what you 
please, and then let the one that " makes good " have the position. 
Let it be a matter of who can " make good," for the taxpayers 
have a right to the best. 

E. H. Dubois, Ph. d., 

New York, February 20. The Morris High School. 

April nth, 1910. 
To the Editor of the Outlook, 

New York City. 

Dear Sir: — The Outlook of April second had an editorial on 
" Equal Pay for Equal Work." 

At an official meeting, the Board of Education of the City of 
New York voted against equal pay, the vote standing twenty- 
three to sixteen. To say that the decision is final is to be absolutely 
unacquainted with the movement. Four years ago no one in the 
board supported the proposition. Now after four years of agita- 
tion, the Board of Education itself, not a fraction of one committee, 
gave the matter a serious and dignified consideration and sixteen 
members supported it. " Revolutions do not go backward." If in 
four years the women teachers can gain sixteen supporters, are 
they going to stop? The vote then is not in any way final. It 
is a great encouragement. 

The three ladies who voted against the women teachers were 



510 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

new appointees. Their position in the community had shut them 
out from all contact with the common schools. Therefore not as 
a matter of judgment, because judgment implies .knowledge, but 
as a matter of custom they followed man's judgment. It takes 
an independent and courageous woman to help other women. 

One objection the Outlook presented is that " men and women 
cannot do equal work." Two men cannot do equal work. There 
are in the schools some very inefficient male teachers and some of 
loose habits, yet they get the same pay as efficient male teachers. 
Women teachers in the City of New York have been assigned over 
and over again positions identical with male teachci's. Their work 
has been given the highest possible rating again and again by male 
principals and male superintendents. Over against the Outlook's 
present opinion these other opinions have been reiterated for years. 
No one ever questioned the equality of woman's work until she 
asked equal pay for it. 

The Outlook said one speaker's words were felicitous. The 
speaker was a new member, new to the board, new to America, 
and full of more new ideas than the Outlook may know. He is 
not always so hostile to women. Of course women teachers of 
experience whom he gallantly called in this same speech " semi- 
derelicts," awaken his loudest condemnation. But let the hotels of 
New York City turn out a man and his pseudo wife, and this 
generous member may open his doors to the pair. This new mem- 
ber's entire speech was filled with complete ignorance of the school 
question. 

Next the article said : " The ablest men cannot do as good work 
in teaching a kindergarten as a competent woman." That is a 
matter of opinion. A man invented the kindergarten system. The 
Outlook confuses matters of fact and matters of opinion. It goes 
on to say : " The ablest woman cannot do as good work in super- 
intending a school of boys from fourteen to eighteen as a com- 
petent man." The Outlook thinks so. It is a matter of fact that 
the development of the playgrounds and recreation centers was 
in the hands of a woman until she died. These activities controlled 
boys of the age mentioned, and this work is spoken of most highly 
by the associates and the official superiors of this woman. Further 
than this it is a matter of fact that " superintending a school of 
boys from fourteen to eighteen " has nothing to do with the equal 
pay question. Such a school is a boys' high school and is, and 
always has been, in the charge of a male principal. The super- 
intending of a group of schools containing boys, or girls, is in the 
hands of a number of persons, men and women, and these super- 
intendents receive equal pay already. 

In its third objection the Otitlook was in error. Briefly it says, 
if equal pay were given '' many women teachers would be dis- 
charged." Discharged? Even the women teachers of New York 
City enjoy the provision of Section 1089 of the Charter of the 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 511 

City of New York. The women teachers do die or retire, but they 
are not discharged, for they cannot be, except for cause, and being 
a woman is not a cause for dismissal. 

The second part of the Outlook's third reason says: "Women 
are now doing work which men could do better." How does the 
Outlook know this? It is a mere assertion. If it were a matter 
of fact what an arraignment of the Board of Education! The 
board is consciously giving the boys of this city a cheap bargain- 
counter education. 

The third part of the Outlook's third objection says that equaliz- 
ing by lowering men's salaries would lead to an exodus of men 
from the schools and under wholly feminine influence there would 
be an " exodus of many male pupils." ^ Is the Outlook sure of 
this? There were men in the schools before the Davis law raised 
the men's salaries to their present proportions ; and the boys in 
large numbers leave those schools which are now wholly managed 
by men. 

PRESS COMMITTEE, 
Interborough Association of Women Teachers. 

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CLERGYMEN OF NEW YORK 

CITY. 

We, the women teachers of New York City, twelve thousand in 
number, appeal to you, the clergymen of our city, and ask you to 
bring our appeal to the notice of your congregations by reading 
this letter to them. We do not ask you to support our claim or 
to advocate it, but only to publish it so that the men and women 
of your churches may pass upon the justice of our cause. 

For four years we have tried to get from our city government 
Equal Pay for Equal Work, and we have striven to put the pro- 
fession of teaching on a Civil Service basis so that the work in 
our schools shall be paid for irrespective of the sex of the worker. 

Side by side with the men teachers we teach the same subjects 
to the same pupils from the same text-books through the same 
hours reaching the same results under the same standards. 

In all the years of our struggle for justice it has never been 
successfully maintained that our work is inferior. On the contrary, 
it has been well-nigh universally acknowledged that schools and 
classes governed and taught by women compare favorably with 
those governed and taught by men and that women bring to the. 
care and training of the young a motherly sympathy, patience and 
devotion that make them peculiarly successful in the high calling 
of education. 

Is it just that we should be paid so much less than our male co- 

* See Professor Tborndike's conclusion in chapter on Feminization. — G. 
C. S. 



512 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

laborers for the same work? Does New York supply us with any 
of the necessities or decencies of life for less? Are our rents and 
taxes less? Can we obtain food and clothing for less? Are our 
doctors and lawyers' fees less? Can we live for less in this most 
expensive of all cities by pleading that we are paid less for our 
work as the city's servants? 

Our obligations, too, are as heavy as those of the men in respect 
to life's burdens and responsibilities. On us, too, rests oftentimes 
the care of the aged and infirm ; on us, too, devolves the generous 
duty of helping younger relatives to secure an adequate educa- 
tion ; on us, too, falls the expense of maintaining a home for 
those who could not, unassisted, escape indigence and suffering. 
There are few indeed of our profession who do not share an al- 
ready insufficient salary with those who are more or less dependent 
on them. 

In our work, in our expenses, in all of life's obligations our 
burdens are as heavy as the men's. Only in our pay is there a 
striking and unjust difference and it is this intolerable injustice 
we are striving to remove. 

Nor are we asking our city to do the impossible. New York 
is rich enough, its revenues are vast enough to do justice to all of 
its employees if its money were wisely and economically managed, 
and expended solely for the public good. Other cities and other 
states have placed their schools on a Civil Service basis with 
Equal Pay, and surely New York, the richest and most powerful 
city of the United States, can afford to do what poorer municipali- 
ties have already done. 

We, the women teachers of New York City, base our appeal 
to you, the clergymen of New York City, on the closer relation 
existing between the work of pastor and teacher. Without the 
Church Ideal, which is righteousness, and the School Ideal, which 
is good citizenship, the State could not endure. We are the lay 
preachers of the community. Day in and day out in connection 
with our work in the school-room we teach our boys and girls 
truth, honesty, justice, reliability, self-control, obedience to the 
laws and devotion to duty in private and in public life. 

We are serving the city faithfully to the best of our ability and 
strength. All u<e ask of the city in return is Justice — the justice 
of Equal Pay for Equal Work. 

Will not you, who believe that Justice is a law of the universe, 
give a little space to our cause? 

JOSEPHINE A. RICE, Chairman. 
CARRIE A. HAWTHORNE, 
HELEN LOUISE COHEN, 
JENNIE V. NAUGHTON, 
GRACE C. STRACHAN, 
Committee representing Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers. 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 513 

Mr. Oliver, Superintendent of Schools in San Francisco, said 
while visiting here in 1907 : " In San Francisco \{& pay both men 
and vi^omen teachers on the same schedules. We do not believe 
that a man is any better as a teacher than a woman. In fact, we 
haven't much use for men teachers." When told of the women 
teachers' fight here, he said, " I wish them all success." 

Following are some of the educational associations that have 
formally endorsed " Equal Pay " : 

The Teachers' Association of Troy, Frances J. Galvin, secretary, 
March 13, 1908; Local School Board, District 27; Local School 
Board, District 26; Syracuse Grade Teachers' Association; Bronx 
Teachers' Association. Society of Women Class Teachers ; Public 
Education Society ; New York City Teachers' Association ; Heads of 
Department Association, Manhattan ; Association of Women Prin- 
cipals, Manhattan; Women Principals' Association, Brooklyn; 
Brooklyn Teachers' Association ; Brooklyn Class Teachers' Organ- 
ization; Queens Teachers' Association; Women High School 
Teachers' Association. 

Brooklyn, N. Y., March 11, 1908. 
MISS GRACE C. STRACHAN, 

Pres. Interborough Association of Women Teachers, 
293 Henry Street, Brooklyn. 

My dear Miss Strachan : — Your suggestion of a debate upon the 
essential principle involved in the equal pay movement was re- 
ceived yesterday. While thanking you for the courtesy, and ap- 
preciating the spirit in which the proposition is made, we believe, for 
the following reasons, that no beneficial result would follow such a 
public joint debate. 

The question is one that affects us as teachers in a way very 
different from the way in which the public deems that it affects 
the public. While we as teachers have the question so prominently 
in mind during the present agitation, we are apt to feel that the 
public is deeply sympathetic. The public is interested somewhat 
in the care of all of its servants, more interested in the results 
attained in this particular department, and least interested in such 
matters as affect only the peculiar interests of factions of its serv- 
ing body. Therefore, the audience that would listen to a debate 
such as the one proposed would be composed only of those who 
have a direct pecuniary interest in the question involved. 

This movement has already engendered much of bitterness, due 
to the natural differences in temperament of the factions. Since 
this bitterness has hampered materially the work in the schools, it 
has been the policy of our organization to avoid a discussion that 
inevitably leads to personalities. 

Finally, while appreciating the excellent influence that you per- 
sonally have exerted over the adherents to this cause, but at the 
same time bearing in mind the composition of the audience as in- 



514 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

dicated above, as well as experiences under similar circumstances, 
we believe that few arguments in opposition to the principle would 
be heard by any one not very close to the speaker. 

Believing that a declination to participate in the matter of your 
suggestion demanded a reply that would give the reasons for such 
refusal, and believing that we are all appreciative of the growth 
of dignity in the attitude of both factions, I thank you. 
Very truly yours, 

HENRY C. MOORE, 
Pres. Association of Male Teachers of Brooklyn and Queens. 

Brooklyn, N. Y., April 8, 1910. 

To the New York Press: — On March 23, 1910, you printed on 
your editorial page some remarks and a picture of " John Martin 
of Grymes Hill, Stapleton, S. I., who recently was appointed a 
member of the Board of Education by Mayor Gaynor." 

Permit me to state, as President of the Interborough Associa- 
tion of Women Teachers, that the figures quoted by Mr. Martin 
are taken from the schedules proposed by the Board of Education, 
which schedules the Interborough Association of Women Teachers 
has opposed. Mr. Martin's criticism, therefore, should be directed 
against the Board of Education of which he is a part. It is un- 
fortunate that a member of the Board of Education should speak 
publicly and write for publication before being acquainted with 
facts. 

Among other things he is quoted as saying, " The only positions 
for which the schedules of the Interborough Association provide 
' one salary for one and the same position ' are the city superintend- 
ent and his associate city superintendents, the district superin- 
tendents, and the members of the Board of Examiners." The In- 
terborough Association has never included any of the above-named 
officials in the schedules, as they are paid without reference to sex. 
I might add " without reference to age either." Mr. Martin's refer- 
ences to age indicate a further ignorance of the schedules of the 
Board of Education, not only of this city but practically of all 
cities: almost every Civil Service schedule takes note of experi- 
ence. Mr. Martin confuses " age of schedule " with " age of 
teacher." 

The only connection the Interborough Association has had with 
the salary of superintendents has been that instigated by myself — ■ 
a district superintendent — to prevent the adding of $1000 to the 
salary of district superintendents. I believe the claims of district 
superintendents for a higher salary are sound, reasonable, and 
just; but the injustice which the women teachers are suffering is 
the greatest and the most dangerous evil in our salary schedules 
and should be the first remedied. 

GRACE C STRACHAN, 
President of the Interborough Association of Women Teachers. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 515 



LETTERS— LAWYERS 

Enclosed you will find resolutions which were adopted last 
evening at our club at my request and with the hearty co-opera- 
tion of Mr. Curry, the leader of our district. I hope the women 
teachers of our city will get justice and you can always count upon 
me to use my influence in their behalf. 

March 26, 1908. JOHN J. HALLIGAN. 

FAVORS WOMEN TEACHERS— E. A. TUTTLE WILL GIVE 

$1000 TO A FUND TO ENABLE THEM TO ORGANIZE 

FOR INCREASED PAY 

To the Editors of the Brooklyn Eagle: — I see by the papers that 
the Board of Education is preparing to have an investigation of 
the alleged use of funds raised by the women teachers to assist in 
obtaining legislation to give them the same pay as men for the 
same services. I also see some strong language used regarding 
the improper use of funds and the neglect of duty on the part of 
the women teachers. I have also read Governor Hughes' veto 
message, a most remarkable piece of reasoning. 

I want to enter a protest against what I deem gross injustice 
toward the women teachers, and also I want to protest against 
that form of equity and justice which is based upon the doctrine 
that " might makes right." Oh, mighty man ! it is hard to sur- 
render the prerogative of beating woman. Time was when men 
could not only beat and enslave, but could also kill women. 
While that may not be lawful now, man still adheres to the re- 
finement of the same principle, and still beats woman — by deny- 
ing her the right to vote, the right to be paid equally with men for 
performing equal services, the right to make a living in some 
avocations, the right of equality anywhere if it interferes with 
men's selfish interests. 

The governor's message on the equal pay bill denies justice 
and equity to some thousands of women teachers in Greater New 
York because, forsooth, all the women teachers throughout the 
state, nurses and attendants in other public or quasi-public insti- 
tutions, did not join in the request for justice, and equity, and 
that by signing the bill he would not administer justice and equity 
to everybody alike. 

Consider only for a moment how futile an effort would have 
been by teachers in small communities to have secured legislation 
on this subject, and consider what a hue and cry would have 
been raised if the women teachers of New York City had en- 
deavored to organize the women teachers of the state as well as 
other female workers, to have them join in an effort to secure 
equal pay for equal services. It is rarely that universal justice 



5i6 EQUAL 'PAY TOR EQUAL WORK 

is done by any act of legislation, but if a large measure of justice 
and right be accomplished by a single act of legislation, it is no 
valid objection that it is not universal in its operations. 

Now, as to the proposed or threatened action of our highly 
developed board of education. Is there a man on that board 
who honestly believes that the women teachers of this city have 
used money improperly to influence legislation in their behalf? 
If so let him who is without fault cast the first stone. I doubt 
if any man in this community believes that any person threatening 
suspensions or dismissals of the women teachers because they 
sought to obtain justice and fair treatment would hesitate or re- 
frain from using methods and means far less defensible than any 
used by the women teachers to accomplish any selfish purpose for 
gain or advancement. 

Many years ago I taught school for several years. I believe 
I know something of the character and ability of women teachers. 
I believe in nine positions out of ten the average woman teacher 
will do better work than the average man teacher. I believe the 
women teachers to be the most poorly paid and poorly appreciated 
public servants in this country. I believe also, that the men 
teachers are not properly paid nor appreciated, but I despise the 
men teachers of this city, in so far as they have shown a selfish, 
greedy and unmanly opposition to the equal pay bill. 

I do not often care to express my feelings in a letter to a 
newspaper, but I feel so bitterly indignant over the injustice and 
oppression that have been disclosed in connection with this equal 
pay matter that I cannot refrain from recommending to the 
teachers of this city and this state that they organize at once, in 
this city and throughout the state, so that they may meet the 
weighty objections of our governor's veto message, and also that 
they may no longer have to beg for common justice and fair 
dealing, but so that they may stand erect and demand and secure 
their rights in this matter. I will gladly contribute $1000 to a 
fund to be used to defray the necessary expenses of an organization 
of the women teachers of this city and state, to the end that they 
may compel selfish, greedy man to give them what is their right, 
and what, if decency prevailed, would be given them without wait- 
ing for the enactment of a law. 

I am a rank outsider; I have absolutely no personal interest 
in this contest, but I believe it is time that decent men in this 
city rallied to the support of the women teachers, when all they 
ask is fair treatment and the application of simple justice and 
equity. EZRA A. f UTTLE. 

150 Broadway, Manhattan, June 14, 1907. 

I am heartily in sympathy with your inovement. So far the 
only opportunity I have had for comparing women's work with that 
of my own sex has been along the lines of stenographers, and al- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 517 

though men are more rapid, they are undoubtedly to my min3 in- 
ferior to women for the ordinary purposes of office work. . , . 

My wife, who feels as strongly on the subject as I do, will be 
glad to give you any help she can. 

February 28, igo8. EDMOND KELLY. 

I am heartily in accord witH your movement and believe that if 
women are qualified to teach at all, they should receive the same 
pay as men. Sex should make no difference, or if at all it should 
be in woman's favor. There was an assistant principal, a lady, 
in the high school I attended who had the love and respect of 
every pupil in the school, and three male principals ran their courses 
in the school while the assistant principal remained until old age 
compelled her retirement, and her teachings are remembered by 
her scholars to this day, while the teachings of the principals are 
forgotten. Her quiet, unassuming manner, her dignified but firm 
insistence that work must be performed by the scholar, and her 
judicious approval of work well done, won the esteem of every 
scholar in her class. Cling to the one idea — " Equal Pay for Equal 
Work " — you will win. 

February 4, 1908. SEWARD BAKER. 

Whether the salary be fixed by the legislature or by the municipal 
government (and I believe it should be fixed entirely by the 
municipal government, if we are ever to obtain home rule), women 
should receive the same pay as men for the same service. 

February 4, 1908. WILLIAM M. IVINS. 

I am in full sympathy with your movement. There is absolutely 
no reason, either good or bad, why a woman who does the same 
work as a man, in an equally efficient manner, should not receive 
the same pay that a man does. To attempt to prove the contrary 
is as absurd as it would be for a mathematician to sit down and 
try to prove two and two do not make four, but that they make five. 
January 30, 1908. HENRY A. POWELL. 

I believe in equal pay for equal work and hope you may meet 
with success in the matter. 

March 3, 1908. EDWARD L. COLLIER, 

Lawyer, ex-member Board of Education. 

All who are animated by the spirit of justice and fair play must 
admire, prize and applaud your heroic effort to blot from the statute 
books of this state unjust laws which deny frail women equal 
compensation for similar services rendered by men in our public 
schools. Such laws are simply a survival of that barbaric age 
which deprived women of their property rights to enrich their 
lord and master and his creditors. Chivalric men have united with! 



5i8 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

public spirited women and wiped out most of this heritage from 
barbarous ages. There should be no discrimination in the wages 
of those who work in plastic clay or on the plastic minds of our 
boys and girls. Justice is blind and in the matter of pay it should 
recognize no sex and see only merit and excellence in its public 
servants. 

Trusting that you will triumph in your unremitting toil for this 
betterment of your co-workers. 

EDWARD EVERETT WARNER, 
March 26, 1908. Attorney-at-Law. 

I am very glad to be identified with this movement. 
J. EDWIARD SWANSTROM, 

Ex-President, Board of Education. 

I am with the women teachers to the end of their battle. 

GEORGE FREDERICK ELLIOTT. 

Now, as ever, you may command my services in the laudable 
campaign of " Equal Pay for Equal Work." 

WILLOUGHBY DOBBS, 

Ex-member of Assembly. 

Wishing your cause every success. 

JAMES A. BLANCHFIELD. 

Your communication of the 26th ultimo received. I am in favor 
of the movement for just salary schedules for the supervising and 
teaching staff of our public school system and hope the legislature 
will take such action as may be necessary to accomplish the re- 
sult for which you are working. Sincerely, 

April 8, 1908. HOWARD PENDLETON, JR. 

I assure you that I sympathize heartily with the movement and 
shall be pleased to avail myself of every possible opportunity — ^no 
matter how humble the effort — to advance the good couse. 

FRANK X. McCAFFRY, 
January 20, 1908. Brooklyn. 

The teachers have made a magnificent uphill fight against tre- 
mendous odds, and have laid a foundation for success hereafter 
that a veto this year can only postpone. It would be most unusual 
to carry through in one campaign such a revolution as you have 
started, but the revolution is bottomed on righteousness, and a veto 
will be only an additional reason for further effort. 

May 29, 1907. HORACE E. DEMING. 

I believe in equal rights to all and special privileges to none. 
If a woman does the same work as a man, be it in the coal mines 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 5^9 

of Pennsylvania or in the public schools of the State of New York, 
she is entitled to the same pay. If my daughter does the same 
work as my son she should have the same compensation. Why 
discriminate against a vi^oman because of her sex? I therefore 
glory in the effort of the 13,000 female school teachers of Greater 
New York who are conducting a campaign for equal rights; for 
equal pay for the same work; and it ill becomes men, like Dr. 
Parkhurst, blinded by partisanship, to defame them, and charge 
them with having "entered into an unholy alliance with the 
gamblers." To these noble women I say God bless you, God 
speed you in the effort you are making to right a great wrong, 
and in the only way in which you can do it, by the ballot. 

Your fathers, your brothers, your old pupils who have profited 
by your instruction and are better men and women by reason 
thereof, are with you in this fight, and hope and pray that you will 
relax no effort until the polls close, to accomplish the purpose for 
which you have banded yourselves together. Don't be frightened 
with the untruthful, ill-tempered charge of Mr. Parkhurst, that 
you have " entered into an unholy alliance with the gamblers," but 
gently, quietly and sweetly ask your maligners and those whom 
you find are being influenced by them, why it is that the popular 
demand of last winter that Wall Street gambling should be 
checked was sidetracked at Albany? Everyone concedes that it is 
a far greater evil than race track gambling. Ask them why it is 
that Governor Hughes in his hundreds of speeches the last three 
months has not breathed a word against the Wall Street gamblers. 

It certainly looks to me as if the "unholy alliance with the 
gamblers " was with others than you. 

November 2, 1908. FRANKLIN COUCH. 

I have just read the governor's veto message as printed in this 
morning's Times. I note that he agrees with everyone of our 
arguments. He find no question of " Home Rule " involved, nor 
of " Mandatory " legislation. He admits the existence of gross 
inequalities and that these should be removed. 

He asserts that the legislature is the proper body to which to 
appeal to correct the inequalities. But he says the principle in- 
volved — " equal pay for equal work " — should be applied to one city 
or one locality, or to one branch of the state service. The state 
should apply it to all branches of the state service or to none of 
them. 

This is a plausible argument and a sound one in the abstract, 
but if literally applied in practice would have prevented the ac- 
complishment of almost every change for the better in govern- 
mental policy. 

It is really an obstructionist argument and its fallacy should 
be pointed out in debate, if the legislature will permit debate when 
the bill comes again before it after the veto. The way to begin 



520 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

is to begin, and if one waits to begin till one can do it all, one 
will wait indefinitely. 

If the legislature does not pass the bill over the veto, the gover- 
nor's message should be a call to arms for a new campaign to be 
waged in every city in the state for the application of the principle 
of simple justice in the payment of women in the State Civil 
Service. 

The way has now been cleared for an effective campaign on 
this one definite, clear-cut proposition — equal pay for equal service, 
the same pay for the same work. 

May 30, 1907. HORACE E. DEMING. 

I deeply regret that the women teachers are obliged to continue 
this struggle for equal pay, when your demands are based on the 
soundest principles of equity. I fail to comprehend how people in 
authority can be so unjust in this so-called age of enlightenment and 
civilization. The teachers should bear in mind that no victory for 
justice, equal rights, or liberty, has ever been achieved against the 
stronger oppressors in society and in official positions without a 
bitter and protracted struggle, usually not without resort to force. 
I trust you will present your claims again to the Legislature this 
year and that the Bill, when passed, will receive the approval of the 
present Mayor, who has been trained to recognize pure justice and 
to administer it under the aw. If the Mayor and the Governor 
again refuse to approve an Act of the Legislature in your behalf, 
I hope there is a sufficiently strong spirit of unity, mutual interest, 
mutual protection and courage among the women teachers to en- 
force their demands, as they can easily do, without further begging 
the authorities to do them justice. 

Mar. 21, 1910. EZRA A. TUTTLE, Attorney. 

To the Editor of the New York Times: 

Will you permit me space in your paper to say that your comment 
upon the Governor's veto of the teachers' equal pay bill two years 
ago seems to justify an absolutely indefensible position? The 
ground taken in supporting that veto, and the grounds taken by 
the Governor in vetoing the bill, were that the bill should be 
general in character, should apply to all school teachers all over the 
State, likewise employes in the hospitals and other institutions, and 
employes in general under the local or State Government. When 
analyzed, this position means that you must never do right unless 
you can do universal right; you must never do justice unless you 
can do universal justice; you must never correct any evil unless 
you can correct all evil. 

Sucl\ reasoning is absolutely unworthy of your paper or of the 
Governor of this State, and I hope that the Governor's mind has 
been so enlightened by the very reasonable, consistent, and praise- 
worthy persistency of the women teachers during the last three 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 521 

sessions of the Legislature tliat he may appreciate a principle of 
pure and absolute equity. The Vvromen teachers ask no favors, they 
do not ask for higher salaries; they ask to be paid the same as 
men for doing the same work. If they are not capable of filling 
positions in our schools, it is inexcusable that they should be ap- 
pointed to such positions; but if they are capable of filling posi- 
tions, filled also by men, they should have the same pay as the men, 
and it seems idle to repeat an argument which is so plain and in- 
disputable. 

We can understand why a "peanut politician" seeking favors of 
voters and political bosses of greater and lesser degree should veto 
a bill which might impose some additional expense and some in- 
creased taxation, but if these same politicians would refrain from 
"grafting" and the foolish and unnecessary expenditure of millions 
in the administration of the City Government, and would devote 
a fraction of that money to the proper pa3'ment of the school 
teachers, both men and women, it would greatly redound to the 
honor and advancement of our city. 

If it were not for the efficient, devoted, self-sacrificing perform- 
ance of duty by the women teachers of this city our condition in 
a few years would revert to that of the heathen, and we would have 
no city, no homes, no civilization. . . . 

As a graduate of a normal school of this State thirty-four years 
ago, and as a teacher for some years — many years ago — and as a 
practicing lawyer in this city for more than twenty-five years, and 
as a taxpayer in this city, I want to raise my voice in defense of 
what seems to me the most iniquitous oppression on the part of 
men, for no reason that I can understand, unless it may be that 
we regard might to be synonymous with right and because men 
make the laws — and men do the voting — and men govern the school 
board — and men employ the teachers — and men fix the salaries — 
that men may do any injustice that they please to the women 
teachers, and because the women are powerless they must submit, 
and forsooth be disciplined and punished for even requesting that 
equity and justice be done them. 

New York, May 4, 1909. EZRA A. TUTTLE. 

ARGUMENT IN FAVOR OF THE "EQUAL PAY BILL" 

Three points present themselves conspicuously in favor of 
the passage of the bill which equalizes the salaries of men and 
women teachers: First, the nature and operation of an eligible 
list, established on a Civil Service basis, such as that from which 
the teachers in the public schools of New York City are ap- 
pointed; second, the recognition of important changes in eco- 
nomic conditions, relating to the occupation of women in re- 
munerative lines; and, third, the fact that the present law regu- 
lating public school salaries is a gross instance of class legis- 
lation. 



522 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

First: The object of an eligible list established as a result 
of competitive examination, is to insure a given standard of 
merit in candidates for a position, and to eliminate from ap- 
pointment every consideration but that of merit. This is 
plainly shov^^n in the operation of eligible lists in other civic 
departments, especially in those relating to clerks and stenog- 
raphers. There is no line of occupation open to women in 
vi'hich overcrowding and consequent competition operate more 
flagrantly to lower remuneration; but as soon as these workers 
are placed upon an eligible list this competition ceases, and all, 
men and women alike, are placed upon an equal footing. To 
introduce an element of competition among the candidates on 
such a list is to defeat one of the great ends of justice for 
which the list exists. 

It is worthy of note that in other departments of the school 
system than the day schools, namely, in the evening schools 
and summer schools, men and women are paid equally for 
positions of equal rank; and also worthy of note that the pres- 
ent plan in the day schools operates to keep men out of the 
system, as the Board of Education has frequently appointed 
women in preference to men as a matter of economy. 

Second: The entrance of women in large numbers into 
fields of remunerative occupation is often referred to by men 
as a willful turning away from the conventional lines of home 
life and duties. Those of us who have been studying these 
questions through intimate association with large numbers of 
women so employed, are impressed with the fact that in a 
large majority of cases, probably for two-thirds of those con- 
cerned, these women have others wholly or partially depend- 
ent upon them; in short, their work in remunerative fields, so 
far from being a repudiation of home ties, is an expression of 
devotion to home and family. 

This indicates some sweeping changes in economic condi- 
tions whereby masculine support is failing, as it has never be- 
fore done in the history of the world, and the burden of sup- 
port is being shifted to the shoulders of women. Men them- 
selves are not to blame for these conditions, changes in meth- 
ods of business, such as the combinations of capital whereby 
manufacturers and dealers on a small scale are forced out of 
business; changes in methods of manufacturing, whereby men 
trained and experienced in certain lines of work are suddenly 
confronted with conditions requiring adaptation to altered 
methods; the lowering of the age limits for employment, 
whereby many of our largest corporations discharge their old 
employees and will not engage new employees over the age 
of thirty-five years, thus making the employment of men of 
middle age and beyond very difficult; the increased cost of liv- 
ing and especially the large amount of cash required since 



EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 523 

primitive methods of manufacture of clothing and food at home 
have become obsolete; — these and other conditions are making 
an entirely new environment for the support of families. 
Women are stepping into the gap, often at the cost of supreme 
self-sacrifice, vi^ith a nobility that has never been surpassed or 
perhaps equalled in the history of the world. Whether the 
condition be temporary or is to be permanent none of us at 
present know; but it is a condition in which both men and 
women should stand shoulder to shoulder, and in which it is 
inconceivable that one should say to the other — " You shall 
work at a disadvantage, and I shall reserve certain privileges 
to myself, simply because I am a man." 

Third: The present statute which provides that men in our 
public day schools shall receive from 50% to 100% more for 
positions of equal rank and grade is gross class legislation 
favoring one set of workers at the expense of another. It is 
inconceivable that this state government should grant a fran- 
chise to a corporation which franchise should contain a pro- 
vision that the men employed by the corporation must receive 
from 50% to 100% more than women for positions of equal 
rank. It is inconceivable that a law could be placed on our 
statute books, providing for the extension of this obnoxious 
principle to all civic employees. Imagine the people of this 
Commonwealth for one instant tolerating the bare suggestion 
that all men in city or state employ should be thus favored. 
Such a thing could not be. If such a law would be wrong for 
the whole, surely it is wrong for a part. 

CHARLES F. KINGSLEY. 

From the outset of the movement to secure for the women 
who teach in the public schools the same salary as that re- 
ceived by men who do teaching of the same kind and charac- 
ter, I have believed that you should succeed. 

I have followed the varying stages of the movement with 
much interest and I think you have constantly gained ground 
in the public mind and have won over to your side many peo- 
ple who, when the question was first mooted, had no sym- 
pathy with your efforts. 

I trust that the public authorities having this matter in 
charge may, before long, do whatever is necessary to solve this 
problem in such manner as to give equal pay for like service 
to all who work in the public schools regardless of sex. 

Sincerely yours, 

March 30, 1910. DANIEL F. COHALAN. 

Dear Madam. 

In reply to your printed inquiry addressed to me as the 
Fusion candidate for Alderman in the Ninth Assembly Dis- 
trict (Manhattan), asking whether I believe that all city em- 



524 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

ployees whose appointment is made from an eligible list, should 
be paid according to the position held without regard to the 
sex of the employee, I beg to state that when I buy any com- 
modity I do not expect its price to be regulated by the fact 
that the producer of the commodity is a woman or a man. I 
buy the goods and I pay the price. Labor is a commodity like 
any other, and if an individual or a community contracts for 
a certain amount of human effort and time, I see no reason 
why the sex of the persons rendering that labor should be 
made a basis of discrimination. 

If I am elected alderman I shall be glad to hear from you 

further, as I consider our schools far more important than 

subways, and shall do what I can to wipe out the disgrace of 

unutilized school sites and insufficient school accommodations. 

Very respectfully, 

Oct. 20, 1909. GERALD VAN CASTEEL, 

Counsellor-at-law. 

Dear Madam: 

I am in receipt of a letter from your Association requesting 
a reply to the question: 

" Do you believe that all city employees whose appointment 
is made from an eligible list, should be paid according to the 
position held, without regard to the sex of the employee?" 

In answer thereto, I would state that as a general proposi- 
tion I believe that the salary should attach to the position. 

I have had no occasion to give special consideration to the 
application of the principle to the positions of teachers in the 
public schools, but as I understand that the qualifications and 
the character of work required are the same for men and 
women alike, I should, under the circumstances, favor the 
equalization of their salaries. 

Respectfully yours, 

Oct. 25, 1909. JOHN F. GALVIN. 

Dear Madam: 

In placing myself on record as being in favor of your move- 
ment I wish to state that I do so after having made a most 
careful examination of the same. 

How a distinction can be lawfully made, so that the teachers 
of the evening schools and the summer schools of this City, 
whether male or female, are paid according to the grades taught 
by them respectively; and how the attendance officers of the 
Department of Education of this City are paid according to 
their work regardless of sex; and yet the women teachers in 
the day schools of this city are discriminated against in this 
respect, I cannot understand. All of said departments are 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 525 

under the direct supervision of the Department of Education 
of this city. 

I may say, after having spoken to many taxpayers concern- 
ing this matter, I find few who oppose your application, and 
in almost every instance my interview developed the fact that 
those few who were opposed to your measure were not suf- 
ficiently familiar with it to discuss the situation intelligently. 
The name of your measure commonly called "The Women 
Teachers Equal Pay Bill," is possibly misleading, for accord- 
ing to my understanding the women teachers are not asking 
for " equal pay " in so many words. What they seek, as I 
understand it, is a graduated scale of salaries to be paid ac- 
cording to the class taught, regardless of sex; conceding that 
the teachers of the male classes are entitled to greater re- 
muneration for their services than the teachers of the female 
classes. 

It is well known that the male teachers of this city are in 
charge of the male classes in our public schools and in con- 
sequence thereof they would naturally continue to receive more 
for their services than the female teachers, with the exception of 
those few female teachers who are performing identically the 
same labor, teaching the same grade in the male department. 
In that respect I feel that they are performing the same work 
as their brethren, and are entitled to the same pay. 

In no department other than the Department of Education 
is there a discrimination made against women holding posi- 
tions nor does such a condition exist in our State and Na- 
tional oiifices. In fact as above indicated it exists only in cer- 
tain branches of the said Department of Education of this 
city. 

That this is class legislation, there can be no doubt, and 
where the legislature of this State permits the same to con- 
tinue, I feel that the taxpayers are being deprived of the good' 
work which teachers are capable of rendering and which is 
being discouraged by this controversy; for it must be con- 
ceded by students of labor that where a question is pending 
tmdetermined and in controversy, the same work cannot pos- 
sibly be obtained as where satisfaction exists. 

I have expressed myself at length upon this subject for the 
reason that I do not wish to be misunderstood. My opponent, 
the Republican candidate for re-election to the Assembly from 
the i8th Assembly District of Brooklyn, opposed your bill in 
the last Assembly, and that caused me to investigate this issue 
more closely than I would otherwise have possibly done. I 
find that he fathered the Women's equal suffrage bill and am 
at a loss to understand how he can in one breath favor wo- 
men's equality so far as the right of franchise, — the greatest 



526 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

right in this country, is concerned — and in the next breath 
oppose women's rights in respect of their earning capacity, 
when they are performing identically the same work as their 
brother teachers. 

Very truly yours, 

MILTON G. BUCKY, 

Counsellor-at-Law. 

Seventeen hundred male teachers object to thirteen thousand 
female teachers receiving equal emolument for the same class 
work. Why? It certainly could not hurt these men, nor de- 
crease their pay; but animated by a spirit of intolerance and 
narrow-mindedness they raise objection to an act of justice, 
threatening to use their ballots against the legislative friends of 
the women teachers. 

Every one of these thirteen thousand women teachers has 
the power to influence in their just cause, say, an average of 
six votes, with father, brothers, relatives and friends, or 78,000 
votes in Greater New York. This is a low estimate, for all 
broad-minded, liberal-thinking men are with the women teach- 
ers in the fight for their rights; and partisan lines can be for- 
gotten in a just and noble cause. 

The seventeen hundred male teachers may appeal to blind 
partisan prejudice, dividing between the existing parties, but as 
their influence is insignificant, their arguments fallacious, their 
animus contemptible, and their labors indicative of the bigotry 
of a darker age, they will not have followers. 

My New York grammar school experience, and also that of 
all my friends with whom I have discussed the subject, left me 
with grateful recollection of the female teachers, and apprecia- 
tion of their painstaking care and deep interest. 

The weaknesses, selfishness, lack of ability and frequent in- 
justice, of the male teachers -I knew as a boy, were apparent 
to every scholar, and contempt was often expressed by such 
soubriquets as " Pop," " Poppy," " Bully," etc. 

I am most heartily in favor of the Teachers' Equal Pay 
Bill. 

P. E. DOWE, 
Ex-president Commercial Travelers' National League. 

That equal service is entitled to equal reward is quite as 
susceptible to proof as is the statement that two and two equal 
four. 

If men are more capable teachers than women, then women 
must necessarily suffer if the pay be equal. The city will, or 
should, employ the strongest teachers the salaries will procure. 

Is the opposition of the male teacher to the equalization of 
pay therefore dictated by chivalrous sentiments? While not 




Hon. James A. Foley^ 
Fatkek of Assembly "Equal Pay Bill" of 1909. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 527 

entirely practical, it would be at least graceful and pleasing. 
I regret to say, however, that I recently discussed the matter 
with two male teachers and they told me that they objected 
to an increase of pay for the women teachers because they 
(the male teachers) had intended to ask for increased salaries 
for themselves. 

This, then, is the cause of their indigestion! 

Wishing you justice and success, synonymous terms in this 
case. 

March 30, 1908. JOHN T. GILROY. 

LETTERS— JUDGES 

I have watched the efforts of your Association to obtain 
favorable legislation, and I have been, and am, in sympathy 
with this effort because I can see no reason why sex alone 
should give rise to inequality of compensation. I do not think 
there is any body of public servants more devoted to duty than 
are the school teachers of Greater New York, and I wish them 
all success in obtaining satisfactory legislative recognition of 
their ability and fidelity. 

PETER A. HENDRICK, 

January 23, 1908. Justice, Supreme Court. 

I sympathize with your move. 

FRANK C. LAUGHLIN, 

Justice, Supreme Court. 

It was a pleasure to sign and transmit to the Committees of 
Senate and Assembly the postals enclosed in your letter. I 
will directly communicate with the members I know, I wish 
you success in your efforts. 

Please command me whenever you think I can be of service 
to you. 

LUKE D. STAPLETON, 

April 21, 1909. Justice, Supreme Court. 

I am in thorough sympathy with your movement to secure 
Equal Pay for Equal Work for the school teachers of New 
York. 

SAMUEL SEABURY, 

December, 1909. Justice, Supreme Court. 

Your invitatioH to join the demonstration in favor of equal 
pay received. In my judgment your efforts to that end should 
be successful. 

January 26, 1908. HOWARD J. FORKER, Justice. 



528 EQUAL PAY. FOR EQUAL WORK 

Wishing you success in all your undertakings and especially 
in this one. 
January 20, 1908. PATRICK KEADY, Justice. 

Call on me for anything that I can do to aid you in your 
cause. 
January 13, 1908. JOHN F. HYLAN, Magistrate. 

CITY, COUNTY, STATE, NATIONAL OFFICERS AND 
POLITICAL LEADERS 

I am in favor of the bill, and sincerely hope it will become 
a law at this session. 

JOHN, D. GUNTHER, 
March 2, 1908. Alderman, 57th Dist., Brooklyn. 

I am most heartily in favor of the Teachers' Equal Pay 
bill, believing that it is but an act of justice to a superior body 
of public servants. 

I can at the same time assure you of the support of my party 
associates in the Assembly. As a member of the Rules Com- 
mittee I shall be in favor of reporting it to the House. 

You are at liberty to use this letter in any manner you see 
fit. 

DANIEL D. FRISBIE, 

April 22, 1909. Democratic Leader, Assembly. 

On Monday night, April 13, 1908, the Kings County Inde- 
pendence League unanimously indorsed the Teachers' Equal 
Pay bill. ALFRED J. BOULTON. 

Assuring you of my hearty co-operation in and sympathy for 
your movement, and wishing your Association every success 
in its undertaking. 

January 17, 1908. (SENATOR) WILLIAM SOHMER. 

I am glad the Teachers' Equal Pay Bill passed the Legisla- 
ture, almost unanimously. It speaks well for the intelligence 
and sense of justice of the respective members of the Assembly 
and the Senate of the State of New York. Of course, the 
Mayor and the Governor should approve the bill. I will do 
everything in my power to bring this about, and to that end 
have written very strong letters to Mayor McClellan and Gov- 
ernor Hughes, and I cannot see how they can possibly refuse 
again to sign the bill in the face of the overwhelming public 
sentiment in its favor. 

WM. SULZER, 

May 3, 1909. Member, House of Representatives. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 529 

I am in entire sympathy with your movement, and have al- 
ways strongly believed in the principles of your association. 

I never yet have been able to see how, under any circum- 
stances, it is fair that when equally efficient work is done by 
women as by men, in any walk of life, they should mot receive 
the same compensation. 

J. VAN VECHTEN OLCOTT, 

April 23, igog. Member, House of Representatives. 

I have always been in favor of the Bill, " Equal Pay for 
Teachers," and when the bill is on final passage I shall voice 
the sentiments of every member of my Club who are to a man 
in favor of the Teachers Equal Pay Bill. 

THOMAS J. M'MANUS. 

March 21, 1908. 

I am in favor of the principle of equalization of teachers' 
salaries and the only difficulty in my mind is the question of 
expense — can the city afford it? 

C. H. FULLER, 

February 21, 1907. Member, Senate. 

I was Mayor of Syracuse from 1895 to 1902, and during that 
period our Charter was changed three times, and the changes 
radically affected the school system of Syracuse. 

I always found Senator White, of Syracuse, the Chairman 
of the Senate Cities Committee, to be in favor of doing justice 
to the women teachers. 

I am not familiar with present demands of the teachers, and 
if you will inform me when we meet next, I should only be too 
glad to do what little lies in my power to help you and your 
Organization. 

January 31, 1908. JAMES K. M'GUIRE. 

I am in hearty accord with you in your desire to improve 
the condition of the women teachers by securing for them 
" equal pay for equal work." Justice, not charity, should be 
the motto. I sincerely hope your bill becomes a law at this 
session of the Legislature. 

M. A. FITZGERALD, 

January 24, 1908. Deputy Secretary of State. 

The teachers have a good cause — one that strongly appeals 
to all classes of people — and I hope it will win. You have my 
very best wishes for success. 

JOHN S. WHALEN, 

January 27, 1908. Secretary of State. 



530 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I cannot emphasize too strongly my sympathy with you and 
all connected with you in the movement that you have under- 
taken. It is through the kindness, patience and intelligence 
of women like you and those associated with you that the 
first teachings of men like myself and all those in public life 
were attained. What we were taught by you we have never 
forgotten, and that the pay of the women teachers should not 
be the same as that of the men is something which I cannot 
understand. It is an injustice, and any little influence which 
I may possess you are at liberty to call on if you think that in 
any manner I can further the cause of justice — for such I con- 
sider your fight. 

With very best wishes for your ultimate success, I remain 
as always, " A Friend of the Women Teachers." 

GEORGE F. SCANNELL, 

February 4, 1908. Superintendent of Highways. 

Your movement, to put the teaching force of the public 
schools in the City of New York (male teachers and women 
teachers) on an equal footing, has my hearty support and what- 
ever aid I may be able to render you I will gladly give. 

With best wishes for the success of your tmdertaking. 

JULIUS HAUSER, 

January 17, 19908. State Treasurer. 

It affords me great pleasure to write to Governor Hughes 
in behalf of the White Bill. I hope the Governor will sign 
the bill. 

LAWRENCE T. LEE, 

May 22, 1907. Department of Commerce and Labor. 

I am unalterably in favor of the principle that where men 
and women are appointed to positions in the same grade or 
rank they should receive the same pay. The character of the 
work, and not the sex of the worker, should fix the compensa- 
tion. If, as is claimed, there is not money enough to pay the 
teaching force required, which I for one do not believe, then 
the women teachers should not be the only sufferers. The 
argument that there are greater demands upon men than upon 
women is entirely irrelevant. If it were valid, it would re- 
quire that the bachelor should receive less pay than the man 
with ten children, and the thrifty man much less pay than the 
spendthrift. I am in favor of legislation providing for equal 
pay for equal work regardless of sex, on a ground entirely 
outside of its being required by justice — on the ground that it 
is involved in the very fundamental conception of democracy, 
which requires equality of opportunity and equality of the re- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 531 

wards of genuine labor based upon the character of the work 
performed. 

J. D. BELL, 
March 6, 1908. Corporation Counsel for Brooklyn. 

Wish you success. 

MICHAEL STAPLETON, 
Alderman, 2d Dist., Manhattan. 

Hon. William E. Morris bids me to assure you of his sym- 
pathy with the movement. 

D. S. M'CORMICK, 
Cor. Sec. Tammany Hall, 35th Assembly Dist. 

I am in hearty sympathy with you and your fellow teachers 
in your just appeal. If I can facilitate or aid in your just en- 
deavor in any way possible, you have only to let me know 
to secure my earnest help. 

JAMJES S. CLARKSON, 

January 17, 1908. United States Custom Service. 

Wishing you all success. 

HERMAN RINGE, 
January 18, 1908. Secretary, Borough of Queens. 

I am in hearty sympathy with the good cause. I am in 
favor of your bill and will assist in its passage in any way 
possible. 

WILLIAM DUANE, 

February 29, 1908. Deputy Chief. 

I am in hearty accord with your cause and wish it every 
success 

JOHN HETHERINGTON, 

Assistant District Attorney. 

My sympathies are positively with you in your noble fight for 
justice and fair play. I taught school for seven years in a district 
and under a system where equal pay was obtained. The results 
were admirable and the system attained a high degree of perfec- 
tion. 

M. F. CONRY, 
Congressman, New York. 

I consider it a duty as well as a pleasure to attend your 
Mass Meeting. 

JOHN D. M'EWEN, 
Republican Leader, Queens. 



533 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I am uncompromisingly for equal pay for equal work. 

CHARLES FREDERICK ADAMS. 

You may use my name as you see fit, if it will help your 
cause for Justice. 

JOSEPH H. deBRAGGA. 

I am firmly convinced of the justice of your cause, and will 
support it when the opportunity to do so presents itself. 

P. J. M'GRATH, 

Member of Assembly. 

I hope that you will meet with every success in your work. 
There are no employees of the city who render greater service 
to the community than do the school teachers. 

R. WALDO, 

March 29, 1910. Commissioner, Fire Department. 

I am in thorough sympathy with the movement which has 
for its object equal pay for equal work, without regard as to 
whether it is a man or a womaa who does the work. This, 
it seems to me, should apply not only to teaching, but to any 
other work in the public service or in private business. 

Those who employ men and women to work either with 
their hands or their brains are buying a commodity, and it 
is not a square deal to pay less to a woman for that commodity 
than to a man, just because circumstances and traditions make 
it possible to discriminate in favor of the man. It is neither 
common sense nor common justice, nor in accordance with eco- 
nomic rules. On the contrary, it is rank injustice to the one who 
receives the lesser compensation. It is discrimination against the 
so-called weaker sex for which there is no just or legitimate 
excuse. 

In recent years many women have taken up important 
branches of work which it had previously been thought could 
only be performed by men, and, in countless instances, they 
are just as successful as men. This, of course, has always been 
largely true of teachers. All of these women and all men who 
are moved by a sense of justice, rather than by selfish motives, 
should congratulate you and your associates on what you have 
done to bring about a change for the better for your sex. 

February, 1910. WILLIAM LEARY. 

BRYAN ENDORSES WOMEN TEACHERS' "EQUAL 
PAY" MOVEMENT 

Col. William Jennings Bryan has come forth rather un- 
expectedly as an ally of the " equal pay for equal work " move- 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 533 

ment, which is being propelled to all parts of this country by 
thousands of women teachers. This fact became known yester- 
day when Col. Bryan was approached by a representative of 
the 13,000 women teachers of this city who are fighting to have 
the legislature equalize the salary standards of the men and 
the women teachers employed in the public schools here. 

Mr. Bryan said he was not familiar with the local school 
situation, but he authorized this statement to be made: 

" I believe in the general principle of equal pay for equal 
work, and I believe that the position should carry the salary, 
irrespective of the sex of the incumbent." 

Mr. Bryan was then asked this question: 

" Do you think that if the legislature was responsible for the 
present unjust discrepancies in the salaries of women teachers 
and men teachers, it should be appealed to to rectify these 
discrepancies? " 

" As I said," replied Mr. Bryan, " I am not familiar with the 
local situation, but I believe that when any body, legislative 
or otherwise, is responsible for conditions which need rectify- 
ing, that body should be appealed to for relief. — New York Even- 
ing Telegram, 1907. 



I am heartily in favor of the Association's efforts for more 
remuneratory salaries for the women teachers, thereby in- 
creasing the efificiency and raising to a higher standard the 
teachers of our Public Schools. 

Please allow me to congratulate you on the disinterested 
work you are doing so well and which is bound to meet with 
the success it so well deserves. 

With best wishes. 

February 5, 1908. JOHN J. MURPHY. 



The earnest conscientious effort of yourself and members 
of your association to establish the principle of equal pay for 
equal work is bound to be successful, even though it has re- 
ceived a temporary set-back. 

With best wishes. 

April 7, 1910. JAMES F. HOEY. 



WOMEN'S CLUBS 

I am with you and your colleagues heart and soul, and you 
have my best wishes for your ultimate success, 

(MRS. E. J.) JEANIE D. GRANT, 
March S> 1908. President, Chiropean. 



534 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Assure you of my hearty sympathy with the work you are 
doing. 

. (MRS. N. E.) LOUISE D. HULBERT, 
February g, 1908. First Vice-President, National Society 

of the Empire State. 

You have my best wishes for your success and any time that 
I can be of any service, I hope you will call upon nie. 

HELEN ARTHUR, 
March 2, 1908. Lawyer. 

I'm with you, of course, absolutely. You are bound to win 
out in time, because you are right. Everything in the way of 
logical argument is on your side, to say nothing of just plain 
every day common justice. 

January, 1908. KATHERINE D. BURNETTE, M. D. 

Wishing you success. 

ELLA L. BLAIR, 
December, 1909. President, State Federation of Women's 

Clubs. 

Equal pay for equal work is a grand rallying cry, and with 
your great organization so splendidly efficient you surely must 
succeed. 

(MRS. T. E.) ELLEN A. LONERGAN, 

Second Vice-President, Chicago Women's 
January 26, 1908. Club of N. Y. City. 

Will do all in my power to help you. 

(MRS. STEPHEN D.) AGNES L. STEPHENS, 
January, 1908. Director, State Federation Woman's Clubs. 

Best wishes for success. 

January, 1908. MRS. S. DICKINSON LEWIS. 

I most heartily endorse the work in which you and your as- 
sociates are so nobly and faithfully engaged. I trust you will 
gain your object this winter. Rights are not adjusted in a day, 
particularly the rights for Woman, but success will come 
eventually and women will have equal pay with men, not only 
as teachers, but in every work they undertake. 

(MRS. THOMAS H.) LUCY E. WHITNEY. 

January 18, 1908. 

I am heartily in sympathy with the purpose of this meeting 
and assure you of my co-operation and all the influence I may 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 535 

have. Hoping the Women Teachers may be successful this 
time. 

MARY J. MACNUTT, 
January 20, 1908. President, Minerva. 

I am now, as I have always been, a strong advocate of equal 
pay for equal work. Any movement toward this end among 
teachers has my warm sympathy and support. 

MRS. HARLOW R. BROWN, 
Pres. School Settlement Association, 
Sec. Local School Board, Dist. 31. 

This movement for "equal pay" is very significant. It is 
based upon a just foundation, and the result should prove 
rightful and normal. 

Heartily wishing you a successful Bill passage. 
MARY MOORE ORR, 

January 31, 1908. Sec. Local School Board, Dist. 27. 

Good wishes to you. 

January, 1908. VIRGINIA C. GILDERSLEEVE. 

I am in favor of and in entire sympathy with your move- 
ment. I have not heard that Mrs. Humphrey Ward, Edith 
Wharton, and other women writers are offered lower royalties 
because of their sex. 

As to men with family responsibilities requiring larger 
salaries than women, I would say there are too many women 
nobly shouldering heavy responsibilities for this to be just 
ground for discriminating against them. 

I am ignorant as to whether bachelors receive less salary 
than benedicts. 

"Equal pay for equal work" is the only reasonable con- 
clusion. 

February 7, 1908. MARGARET W. HUGHAN. 

I am always ready to do whatever I can to help you in the 
splendid work. 

MARY G. HAY, 
December, 1909. Vice-President, General Federation 

of Women's Clubs. 

It is a principle of which I most thoroughly approve. 
December, 1909. JESSIE ASHLEY. 

The Daughters of the Empire State are more than willing to 



536 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

endorse the " Equal Pay Bill," and if there is anything further 
we can do, command us. 

(MRS. GERARD) MARY W. BANCKER. 
January, 1908. President. 



The Chiropean endorses the " Equal Pay Bill " supported by 
the Interborough Association of Women Teachers and asks 
the Legislature to pass and the Mayor and the Governor to 
approve the same. 

JULIA F. RING, Secretary. 

(Largest w^omen's club in. Brooklyn.) 

The Little Mbthers' Aid Association and its Auxiliaries, at 
its regular meeting held March 5th, heartily endorsed the res- 
olution for the Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bill— and sent letters 
to that effect to the Governor, their Senator, and Assemblyman 
Conklin. 
With every wish for your ultimate success. 

EMILIE VAN BEIL, Secretary. 
MRS. CLARENCE BURNS, President. 
March 7, 1908. 

Whereas, The Women's Republican Association of the State 
of New York believe in the principle of equal pay for equal 
work, and whereas requirements for both preparation and work 
are the same for women as for men school teachers in the 
City of New Yok, while the pay is far in excess for the men 
teachers and whereas discrimination because of sex is unfair 
and unwarranted. 

Resolved, That we endorse the amendment to the Davis Law 
known as "The Teachers' Equal Pay Bill," and pray that our 
request be granted. 

MRS. JAMES G. WENTZ, President. 
MISS HELEN VARICK BOSWELL, 

First Vice-President. 
MRS. CLARENCE BURNS, Chr., Ex. 
MRS. EDWARD P. SWAN, Secretary. 
March 10, 1908. 

It is a thing my heart and soul is in. Wishing you every 
success'. 

MRS. R. A. BENEDICT. 



I am most heartily in favor of your aims. 

MRS. H. S. STOWE. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 537 

Our Society is in sympathy with your effort to secure Equal 
Pay for Equal Work. 

JANETTE L. BOYNTON. 

I am with the teachers every inch! 

MARTHA WENTWORTH SUFFREN. 

Wishing your cause the greatest success. 

LUCY CRAPO WINTER. 

I have full sympathy with the proposition of Equal Pay for 
Equal Work, 

IDA M. TARBELL. 

ENDORSEMENTS BY. 

Society for Political Study; Phalo Club; Optima Club; Equal- 
ity League of Self-Supporting Women; Philemon Literary 
Club of Tottenville, of the City of New York; The Woman's 
League of New York State of the City of New York; Profes- 
sional Women's League; College Women's Club; Sorosis; Chi- 
cago Women's Club of New York City; Woman's League, of 
New York State; West End Woman's Republican Associa- 
tion; The Woman's Press Club, New York City; Brooklyn 
Woman Suffrage Association; State Federation of Women's 
Clubs, New York; New York City Federation of Women's 
Clubs; Women's Democratic Club; National Daughters Empire 
State; Washington Heights Chapter, Daughters of American 
Revolution; Equality League of Self-Supporting Women. 

MISCELLANEOUS 

Extending to the Association my best wishes. 

HENRY THOMPSON. 
April 4, igio. Commissioner of Water Supply, Gas 

and Electricity. 

There is no organization — and no woman — to whom we all give 
greater respect and good will, than your Association and Miss 
Strachan. 

HELEN VARICK BOSWELL, 
April 5, 1910. President, The Women's Forum. 

I desire at this time to say to you that your cause has, I believe, 
the support of every sane and honest taxpayer, and like all causes 
that are right it will win in the near future. 

Yours very truly, with best wishes for the success of your cause, 

CLEMENT J. DRISCOLL, 
April g, 1910. Political Editor, N. Y. Journal. 



538 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

With all good wishes and a " God bless you " in your work for 
womanhood. 

March 30, 1910. CHARLOTTE ERRANI. 

In accepting we desire to express the hope . . . that every 
object of the Interborough may be fulfilled in the near future. 

EDWARD D. FARRELL. 
April 2, igio. Ex-District Superintendent of Schools. 

I'll be at the Dinner. It will give me an added opportunity of 
showing as far as my official position will allow that I'm an ardent 
advocate of equal pay for our women teachers. With all good 
wishes, and again regretting that I can't do as much for you in 
this matter as I could wish, I am 

MATTHEW C GLEESON, Chaplain. U. N. S. 

Mrs. Markham (herself an old teacher) and I will be happy to 
attend the Dinner on the sixteenth of April. You already know 
that we are both in sympathy with the labors of teachers and their 
aspirations. 

March 25, 1910. EDWIN MARKHAM. 

You have made a brave fight and I hope you will not grow dis- 
couraged with this defeat (the vote in Board of Education.) You 
are a strong body of women and must stand together. 

MARY E. TRAUTMAN. 
March 21, 1910. Health Protective Association. 

I hope that any time our club, the National California, or I can 
be of any use to you or your great Association you will command 
us. I personally am at your service for all things. 

April 3, 1910. ENO. W. VIVIAN (Mrs. Thomas J.) 

Trust you will meet with the success that you so well deserve. 

HENRY P. MOLLOY, 
April 14, 1910. County Clerk. 

I am called to Philadelphia and it is imperative, or believe me, 
I would be with your fine body of women. I had hoped to hear 
such speeches as would put to shame the action of the Board of 
Education not long since, and when members of that board were 
of our own sex. Be firm, and remember that Right always wins. 
It may take some time, but it will win. 

ALICE FISCHER HARCOURT. 

In sympathy I am fully. 

ARTHUR DAY. 
April 14, 1910. Vice-Pres. Savoy Trust Co. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 539 

I hope that your efforts to secure equal pay may be crowned 
with success. 

DANIEL HARRIS, 
April 15, 1910. President, Workingmen's Federation 

of the State of New York. 

Nor need I add since you know my record in regard to all the 
matters in which you have been interested, how much of success 
I wish you in all your undertakings. 

JOHN F. AH'EARN. 
April 6, 1910. Father of the " Ahearn Bill." 

Nothing would give me more pleasure than to meet face to face 
the brave women who are fighting the battle of equal pay for equal 
work. 

April 6, 1910. RACHEL FOSTER AVERY. 

Wishing you and your co-workers every success. 

FRANCIS P. BENT, 
March 31, 1910. Vice-Chairman, Board of Aldermen. 

Please accept my cordial good wishes for the success of your 
cause, and believe me. 

April 2, 1910. GEORGE W. BRUSH, M. D., Ex-Senator. 

Assure you that I will gladly help you to attain for women teach- 
ers that which you desire, i.e., — equal pay — in any way I can. 
April 12, 1910. JOHN H. CAMPBELL. 

I wish you all kinds of good luck and if I can do you any good 
at any time please call on me. 

D. T. CORNELL. 
April 4, 1910. Real Estate and Auctioneer. 

Feel very confident that your cause will ultimately triumph. 

Let me assure you of my best wishes for the accomplishment of 
all your aims. 

April 13, 1910. ALFRED B. HALL. 

I will congratulate you on the fact, though you may not realize 
it, that your fight for equal pay is almost won. Let a few more 
cities do what Milwaukee did on April 5th, and you will get any- 
thing you want. 

April 12, 1910. B. C. HAMMOND. 

Kindly fill my place with someone who needs converting. 
March 30, 1910. ALGERNON S. HIGGINS. 



'S40 'EQUAL 'PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

I trust that the long battle for justice may never be abandoned 
by the Association until full justice is established. 

FLORENCE KELLEY. 
March 30, igio. Consumers' League. 

Wishing you every success, and that the occasion will be an en- 
joyable as well as a profitable one. 

April 4, 1910. DANIEL A. McCORMlCK. 

Otherwise I would be most happy to be present, to testify by 
my presence, to the high regard in which I hold the Association 
and its aims. 

MRS. DONALD McLEAN, 
April 4, igio. President, Daughters of American Revolution. 

I trust you will have a very pleasant social gathering and hope 
much good may result. 

March 24, 1910. MONS. P. F. O'HARE. 

Wishing you and the members of the Association success. 

Dr. ANTONIO PISANI, 
March 19, 1910. Commissioner, Board of Education. 

I wish your Association every success. 

DANIEL J. RIORDAN, 
April 5, 1910. U. S. Representative. 

Wishing you success in your laudable efforts, I have the honor 
to remain, 

THOMAS F. SMITH. 
March 30, 1910. Secy., Tammany Hall. 

With kind regards, and best wishes for the Women Teachers' 
Association, 

April 4. 1910. SAM A. SCRIBNER. 

Of course, you know I am deeply interested in your work. 

J. E. SULLIVAN. 
April II, 1910. Commissioner, Board of Education. 

Wishing you success in your work. 

REV. CHAS. A. CASSIDY, 
St. Peter's Rectory, New Brighton. 

My best wishes will be with them, albeit I myself must that day 
be in Washington. 

ALFRED HENRY LEWIS, 457 W. 14th St. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 541 

Assuring the Association of my warmest sympathy. 

CHAS. H. HYDE, City Chamberlain. 

MISCELLANEOUS 
C. A. BECKER, M. D. JOHN B. BYRNE, M. D. 

FRANK LeC. DOWE, M. D. GEORGE C. OWENS, M. D. 

WILLIAM H. GARY, M. D. 

I am very glad to lend my individual support to your cause. 

J. RICHARD KEVIN, M. D. 

I am in thorough sympathy. Woman suffers injustice in many 
ways under our industrial system and semi-barbarous civilization, 
but denying her equal pay for equal service with men is the rankest 
and most apparent injustice of all. 

DAVID ALLYN GORTON, M. D. 

The professions of Law and Medicine do not discriminate against 
women in the remuneration for equal service, and I see no reason 
why women teachers should not receive the same salary as men for 
the same work. 

Feb. 6, 1908. WM. L. LOVE, M. D. 

I hope you will succeed and I have no doubt you will, when 
those that are now blind see the " true light." 

EDWARD H. GREEN, Brooklyn Navy Yard. 

Your cause should receive the hearty co-operation of ail those 
who believe in the supremacy of our country and wish to maintain 
it. " Equal pay " for our school teachers is just as much a right 
that should be maintained to-day, as was '' Equal Rights " when our 
Republic was founded. 

Feb. 26, 1908 MAURICE KAHN. 

LETTER— FOURTH ANNUAL BANQUET— APRIL 16, 1910 

I had expected to be present and, with the time permitted me, 
to endeavor once again to impress upon the membership of your 
great Association the undeniable justice of its cause and to urge a 
confident reliance, that, in the near future, governmental condi- 
tions, already foreshadowed and easily discerned, guarantee the 
recognition of the sound principle of political economy, that for 
identical work, simple justice requires there shall be identical pay, 
without regard to the particular sex of the individual by whom such 
work is performed. 

I know how utterly disheartening it is to have one's position 
misrepresented in any way in which your opponents have dealt 
with this question. I know how indignant your membership must 



542 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

be that, in urging a just cause, they find themselves antagonized only 
by the forces of selfishness and expediency. And yet, I would have 
the women teachers remember that they are meeting with only 
the experience which precedes the triumph of every endeavor to 
.impress simple justice upon the laws of the Nation and State. 

When the day seems darkest, when the outlook is apparently least 
promising, when, after repeated failure, despair threatens dominion, 
then, it is that loyalty and energy, united in determined effort, gain 
their triumph. 

With every good wish for the membership of your Association, 
I am with special grateful acknowledgments to yourself. 
Very truly yours, 
April 14, 1910. THOS. F. GRADY. 



LETTER SENT BY MAJOR EDWARD R. GILMAN, ONE OF 

THE SPEAKERS LISTED FOR THE FOURTH 
ANNUAL BANQUET, WHO WiAS UNABLE TO ATTEND 

We are living in an age of marvelous progress — the greatest age 
in the history of the world — the age of the telephone, the telegraph, 
the wireless, the electric motor, the subway, and even the aeroplane; 
but wonderful as are all these great inventions, the greatest dis- 
covery of the century has not yet occurred; but it is sure to come. 
The new discovery is the light that will come and give women 
justice. The century will not be complete in all its great achieve- 
ments until it has undone the injustice that has been done to women 
since the world began, until it has put her on an equality with 
man. We shall be not far above barbarians imtil this has been 
accomplished. We have made some little progress in the State 
of New York. Women can at least own property and we are 
beginning to allow them to hold certain executive positions. They 
are demonstrating their entire fitness for these positions. Why we 
should divide our teachers into two classes simply because one 
wears skirts and the other pants, I cannot understand. The 
teachers should be paid according to the services they render, ir- 
respective of sex, creed, or age. Age, creed, or the color of one's 
hair should not enter into the question of compensation, nor should 
the question of sex. The only things to be considered are ability 
and fitness. 

There is no argument at all in the matter from my standpoint, 
but I would go a great deal further than merely giving " Equal 
Pay " to women. I should make women the only teachers of our 
boys and girls. They are better fitted for this work than men are. 
Men are all right as teachers after the children have reached a 
certain age, but women are the only proper teachers for the young 
and also for the girls. The male in the animal race is generally a 
polygamous brute, and while in the human race he is naturally 



BQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 543 

faithful to his mate and willing and anxious to provide for his off- 
spring, yet he is not inclined to assume the burdens of its daily 
teaching. The mother chicken will take care of her brood even to 
the point of losing her life, but the rooster knows not his own. 
The tom cat even kills its young. All through animal life the male 
cares little for its offspring, while the mother provides for it, brings 
it up, and teaches it how to sustain itself. It is a law of nature, 
and in the human race it is even more pronounced. Man is alwaj^s 
willing to help provide for his family, — often to work like a dog to 
do it. He is most generous and noble in this respect, but he does 
not know how to bring up his children Nature did not intend hiin 
to do so. He is born without that instinct and he cannot acquire 
it. Woman is born with ability to educate and bring up children.' 
It is inborn in her heart and soul. She is their natural educator. 
There is a gentleness and sympathy about a woman that appeals 
to every child, and is almost always lacking in man. I know I felt 
it when I was a boy in school. I liked my men teachers, but I had 
no sympathy with them. I was devoted to my women teachers. 
Their real genuine interest in me was like that of my own mother. 
You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink. 
You can drive a child to school, but you cannot make him work 
unless he is interested in his work. Women can secure this interest 
better than men. 

I wish it were in my power to reorganize the whole plan for 
teachers. I would have women exclusively for the girls and boys 
until they had reached an age where perhaps a man teacher could 
train them as well or better than a woman. The majority of the 
members of the Board of Education should be women. I would 
have no woman on that Board of Education who did not believe 
that women were equal to men. I would not consider sex in the 
matter of the pay of school teachers. I would pay liberal salaries 
to all teachers, as the education of our children is the most im- 
portant thing to our city, and the best talent is none too good. 

Some people believe that the greatest aid to humanity is the 
school of religion, since it aims to teach us how to save our souls 
in eternity; others think that the school of medicine and surgery 
is the greatest because it relieves suffering and prolongs and often 
saves lives ; but I say the greatest blessing to humanity is the 
school teacher, because when education is universal, we will know 
how to live correctly in this world and how to prepare ourselves for 
the world beyond. Education is the foundation of the future suc- 
cess of our city, state, and nation, and in the great City of New 
York with its conglomerate population from all parts of the world, 
sprinkled with socialistic and anarchistic minds, it is of the utmost 
importance that the education of the new generation should be of 
the very best and that a spirit of public pride and patriotism should 
be instilled into the children of to-day — the citizens of to-morrow. 

The work of the educator is the most important work in the 



544 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

world. It is the noblest calling, yet the poorest paid. It is of 
fundamental importance to the future welfare of our country. Our 
city does not hesitate to spend large sums freely for fire and police 
protection and for the mere amusement of the public. Parks, pub- 
lic libraries, bath houses, recreation piers, and bands of music 
are all maintained at the expense of the city to amuse or benefit 
the public, but we growl and kick as if the taxpayers were being 
sandbagged and robbed if we give a teacher half a living salary. 

Now you have my sentiments. If I were so fortunate as to be 
able to go to your dinner, I would not say much other than along 
these lines, except perhaps to say this — that the women on the 
Board of Education who voted against " Equal Pay " should be 
called upon to resign immediately because they publicly admitted 
in that vote that women were not equal to men, and having so 
admitted, the only thing for them to do is resign. They were 
appointed to represent women, not to be dictated to by men. They 
have failed in their duty and they should leave the Board. As a 
citizen and a taxpayer I would call upon them to resign immedi- 
ately, for having admitted that they were not men's equal; they 
should not serve on the same Board on an equality with men. 

There is just one more thing that I would like to say and that I 
would say with pleasure : That all the people in this great city 
should fight with you and for your cause until you have won the 
fight, — a noble cause that should appeal to every man who believes 
in a " square deal " to his fellow men. Let us give a " square 
deal " also to women who are entitled to all our rights, and to my 
mind, two more: The right of man's sympathy and of man's 
protection. 



PART FIVE— CHAPTER ONE 
ENDORSEMENTS 

By a " club to club " canvass among civic, labor and tax- 
payers' organizations, we secured endorsements for our 
" equal pay " bill from more than 300,000 voters. 

Scores of organizations have been won over to the " equal 
pay for equal work" cause by the women's representatives, 
who secured hearings from three to five associations every 
week and explained the women teachers' bill in open meet- 
ing. 

I am confident we would have secured even more en- 
dorsements were it not for the fact that many of the men 
teachers were members of the organizations we addressed. 
In several cases they prevented prompt endorsement of our 
bill by moving that the organization's action upon it be post- 
poned until a later meeting. 

An instance of this character took place at a meeting 
of the Flushing Association, when John Holley Clark, prin- 
cipal of the local high school, moved that the association's 
action upon the " equal pay " bill be postponed until the 
next meeting. Mr. Baumeister, a teacher, seconded this 
motion, and it was carried. 

Despite the opposition of the men teachers, however, we 
have secured the support of sixty-five civic, labor and tax- 
payers' organizations, representing more than 200,000 
voters. (See list following.) 

We are especially pleased with the endorsements of the 
Board of Aldermen, as several members of the Board of 
Education opposed to our bill laid great stress on the anti- 
corporal punishment attitude of the Board of Aldermen at 
the recent hearing on corporal punishment. One of the 
members. Commissioner Robert L. Harrison, said the Board 
of Aldermen was very close to the people and represented 
their views better, perhaps, than any other body in the city. 

545 



546 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

Now that the Aldermen have unanimously endorsed the 
" equal pay " bill, we are hopeful that the Board of Educa- 
tion may regard the Aldermen's action as reflecting the at- 
titude of the people and assist us, instead of fighting our 
salary measure. 

The following is an extract from our reply to Senator 
Fuller in 1908 : " Again is Senator Fuller mistaken in the 
following statement : ' And I speak now with the authority 
of not only New York City individual citizens, but of tax- 
payers' associations, who have considered this matter, hav- 
ing held joint debate between the women and the men, and 
I have in my hand a circular stating that the feelings of 
these various associations are against the bill. Here are 
some of them : Flatbush Taxpayers' Association, the Pros- 
pect Heights Citizens' Association; South Brooklyn Board 
of Trade; the Downtown Taxpayers' Association; the Park 
Board of Trade; the Fulton Street Board of Trade; the 
North Side Board of Trade; the Old Jones Park, and the 
Central and Smith Street Associations; and the Twenty- 
third Ward Property Owners' Association.' While it is 
true that last year the Downtown Taxpayers' Association 
and the Fulton Street Board of Trade did grant us a hear- 
ing, I challenge Senator Fuller to refute the statement that 
not one of the Associations named has heard the men and 
the women in joint debate on this year's Bill. Of those 
named only the North Side Board of Trade gave us even 
a partial hearing and that was before its Committee on 
Education. I challenge him further to refute the statement 
that at the meeting of the Flatbush Taxpayers' Associa- 
tion which passed a resolution disapproving our bill, there 
were present only about 5% of the membership. I am in- 
formed by one of the prominent members of said associa- 
tion that probably 40 of the 982 members were present, and 
that several of these were male teachers. I am informed 
also by a prominent member of the Prospect Heights Asso- 
ciation that a male principal and a male high school teacher, 
both members of said association, were given full and free 
privilege of speaking against our bill, though our request 
for a hearing was not granted. In the South Brooklyn 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 547 

Board of Trade there are also many male teachers. Fur- 
thermore, Senator Travis spoke before this Board in oppo- 
sition to our bill, 

" Moreover, side by side with the short list of associations 
supplied by Senator Fuller, we can place a list of endorse- 
ments of two hundred and fifty civic, political, and taxpay- 
ing associations, business firms and labor unions, not the 
least of which is the unanimous endorsement of the Board 
of Aldermen of the City of New York, given at its stated 
meeting on March 18, 1908; also thousands of individual 
endorsements obtained from citizens ranging in rank from 
millionaires to laborers, whose names have been cheerfully 
given in support of our bill. These form a conclusive refu- 
tation of the implication that taxpayers generally are op- 
posed to the women teachers, /w fact, it is generally be- 
lieved that if the question under discussion could be sub- 
mitted to the voters of the City of New York, the women 
teachers would win by an overwhelming majority. 
" Grace C. Strachan, President, 
" Interborough Association of Women Teachers." 

BOARD OF ALDERMAN— LABOR UNIONS 

The Board of Aldermen of the City of New York at its stated meeting, 
March i8, igo8, unanimously endorsed the Women Teachers' Equal Pay 
Bill by passing the following resolution: 

Whereas, Education is a State function, and the Board of Education in 
the City of New York is a corporate body created by State legislation to 
carry out said State i'unction in the City of New York, and since the salaries 
of teachers in the City of New York are regulated by statute law known as 
"The Davis Law," enacted in 1900 by State legislation; and 

Whereas^ Salaries for teachers in the City of New York are made under 
the provisions of said Davis Law and by said Board of Education of the 
City of New York; and 

Whereas, According to by-laws made by the Board of Education the re- 
quirements for women are the same as those for men, and positions of the 
same grade are given to both men and women; and 

Whereas, The salaries given to women doing the same grade of work are 
from 30 to 100 per cent, less than those given to men in the same grade; 
and 

Whereas, Said Davis Law is the only statute law in the State of New 
York which discriminates against women as economic and industrial units, 
because of sex; be it 

Resolved, That the Board of Aldermen of the City of New York endorse 
the amendment to the Davis Law, known as " The Teachers' Equal Pay 
Bill," since said amendment proposes to establish the principle that the posi- 
tion shall carry the salary in the public schools of the City of New York, 
and since its provisions greatly extend the power of the local authorities in 
the matter of schedules for every grade of the public school system, and 
since said bill carries a four-mill clause providing a tax of four mills upon 
assessed valuation of property as against the present three-mill provision, and 



548 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

also since said bill carries the provision that 93 per cent, of said fund 
shall be devoted to the salaries of teachers of the public day schools; also 
be it 

Kesolved, That copies of this resolution be forwarded to Governor Hughes 
and the Senate and Assembly of the State of New York. 

Adopted by the Board of Aldermen, March 18, 1908, a majority of all 
the members elected voting in favor thereof. 

P. J. Scully, Clerk. 
Compared and Correct. D. M. C. 
Fee paid Mar. 24, 1908. 
Jones, Cashier. 

Extracts from address of Daniel F. Harris, President of Workingmen's 
Federation of New York State at the annual convention held in Syracuse, 
Sept. 17, 1907. 

The bill to increase and equalize the pay of New York City School Teach- 
ers did not have smooth sailing. It was opposed by the Board of Education, 
also by a number of male teachers. Endeavors were also made to cause a 
division among the teachers themselves. In spite of all the opposition the 
bill passed both houses, but was vetoed by the Mayor of New York. 

The bill was again passed over the veto, but was subsequently vetoed by 
the Governor. 

The attempt on the part of the Board of Education to victimize the 
leaders in this fight for equal rights deserves condemnation, to say the least, 
and we trust that the day is not far distant when equal pay ior equal work 
will be the rule and not the exception in all branches of industry regardless 
of sex. 

To Whom it May Concern: 

Whereas, The Consolidated Board of Business Agents of the Building 
Trades of New York and Vicinity, fully believe that the Amendment to the 
Davis Law, introduced by Assemblyman Robert S. Conklin, January 29, 1908, 
known as Assembly Bill 463 or " The Teachers Equal Pay Bill," is equitable 
and just; 

Whereas, That all labor performed by either a Male of Female Teacher in 
our Public Schools, should be on equal or a " Prevailing Rate of Wages " 
schedule, irrespective of sex; and. 

Whereas, That Bill 463 proposes to establish the principle that the position 
shall carry the salary in the Public Schools of the City of New York; 

Be it Resolved, That we, the Consolidated Board of Business Agents of 
the Building Trades of New York and Vicinity, fully endorse and go on 
record, as advocating the passage of Assembly Bill 463, which will do away 
with the present discrimination in salaries of our Teachers, and give to those 
who fulfill their duties, one hundred cents for a dollar's worth of labor 
performed, no matter whether by a Male or a Female Teacher. 

[Consolidated Board of Business 

Agents of N. Y. and Vicinity. 
Organized June, 1906. 
labore omnia vincit.] 
[Seal.] 

Respectfully submitted by Con- 
solidated Board of Business Agents 
Resolution Committee, 

Paul Sperling, 
Frank Hirtzel, 
Joseph LaMonte, 
Richard Mortan, 
James Lennon. 
Attest: Roswell D. Tompkins, 
Board Secretary. 
March 6, 1908. 
Representing 115,000 voters. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 549 

The Board of Delegates of the Building Trades of Brooklyn and 
Vicinity endorses the " Equal Pay Bill " supported by the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers and asks the Legislature to pass, and the 
Mayor and Governor to approve the same. 

Our association takes this action because it believes: 

(a) That salary is the wage for service rendered; 

(b) That when two people — one a man, and the other a woman — fulfill 
the same requirements, pass the same examinations, and are then appointed 
to the same position, they should receive the same pay. 

(c) That the present law as incorporated in Section 1091, of the Charter 
of the City of New York, in indicating salaries for " male " teachers i'rom 
fifty to one hundred per cent, higher than those for " female " teachers in 
the same positions, is the cause of great injustice to thousands of the City's 
best servants, and 

(d) That the majority of the taxpayers are willing to pay one dollar more 
per thousand dollars, to supply the money required to give these faithful 
servants " a square deal." 

Charles Burns, Secretary. 
Representing 75,000 members. 

INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF LOCOMOTIVE 
ENGINEERS 

There is not a locomotive engineer, nor an electric motorman that would 
be willing to see a woman run an engine or motor for less than the standard 
wages; consequently we are a unit in wishing that you succeed in obtaining 
your just dues, viz., as much as a man gets for the same work. 

Yours fraternally, 

M. C. Baldwin, F. A. E. 

Property Owners' Association of the Twenty-third Ward, Bronx, March 
2, igo8. 

Chas. Baxter, Chairman Executive Board, 

By instruction of John Hoffer, President. 

SHOULD HAVE EQUAL WAGES 
A well-attended meeting of the Brooklyn Economic Society was held at 
its headquarters, Fulton and Cranberry Streets, yesterday ai'ternoon. The 
subject up for discussion was: " Should Women Teachers Receive the Same 
Salary as Male Teachers? " After a very animated discussion the affirmative 
side was sustained. — Eagle, December, 1907. 

Extract from Minutes of the Regular Meeting of the City Island Board 
of Trade held at Library Guilding, City Island, March 16, 1908: 

" On motion, duly made, seconded and carried, it was resolved that L. B. 
Bigelow be appointed a delegate to the Taxpayers' Alliance of the Bronx, 
which meets March 27, 1908, at Masonic Hall, 177th St. and 3d Ave., the 
Bronx, and that he be instructed to cast a vote in favor of the Women 
Teachers' Equal Pay Bill, now pending before the Legislature of New York 
State." 

Leander B. Bigelow, 
Secretary City Island Board of Trade. 

Brownville Taxpayers' Association appointed Dr. N. J. Coyne, Jacob 
Marman, Isaac Allen and Saul C. Lavine, a committee to favor the Gledhill- 
Foley Teachers' Equal Pay Bill at the hearing before Mayor McClellan, May 
II, 1909. 

The following is a copy of a resolution adopted by the Board of Trustees 
of the Civic League of the Bronx: 

Resolved, By the Board of Trustees of the Civic League of the Bronx that 



550 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

the State and City authorities be respectfully urged to approve of the bill 
known as the Equal Pay Bill for Women Teachers, for the following reasons: 

Under the present salary schedule, a woman receives $600 the first year 
($660 to teach boys) while a man is paid $900 — half as much again for the 
same work. 

In the gth year (7th year, if boys), with the experience gained, 3 woman 
receives no more than a man without experience in his first year. 

In the 13th year a man receives twice as much as a woman who has been 
the same number of years in the service. 

After teaching 17 years a woman teacher receives less than a man in his 
5th year. 

Both have to follow the same course of study and conform to the same 
requirements, standards, and teaching qualifications. 

Equal pay, regardless of sex, has already been adopted by several large 
cities. It is a matter of simple justice to a faithful body of public servants. 

Resolved, That a copy of the foregoing, duly attested by the President 
and Secretary, be transmitted to the members of the Legislature, the Mayor 
and the Governor, and to the public press of this City. 
Wishing you success, I am very sincerely yours, 

Albert E. Davis, President. 

March 9, 1908. 

THE SOUTH SIDE CIVIC LEAGUE OF JAMAICA, N. Y. 

I am directed to inform you that at the last meeting of our Civic League 
the following resolution has been adopted: 

Whereas, Thid Civic League while not in favor of the bill now before the 
Legislature, amending the Davis' salary schedule for school teachers; be it 

Resolved, That this Civic League does endorse the principle of equal pay 
for equal services to all civil employees. 

Yours truly, 

Samuel Sanders, President. 
G. Maine, Cor. Sec'y. 
April 10, 1908. 

TAXPAYERS' LEAGUE OF RICHMOND HILL 

Member of the United Civic Associations of the Borough of Queens and 
the Allied Civic Associations, 4th Ward, Borough of Queens. 

Richmond Hill, N. Y., March 24, 1908. 
At a well attended meeting oi' this League on the 17th inst., the Women 
Teachers' Equal Pay Bill was endorsed by a good sized majority. 

I have accordingly notified Governor Hughes and Assemblyman De Groot. 
[Seal.] 

CENTRAL LABOR UNION 

BOROUGHS OF BROOKLYN AND QUEENS, COMPRISING THE FOLLOWING: 

Pattern Makers; Park Employees; Piano & Organ, No. 27; Plumbers, No. 
i; Pressman, No. 26; Pressman, No. 51; Painters, No. 670; Painters, No. 
1006; Riggers No. 11561; Theatrical Employees, No. 4; Steamfitters' Asso- 
ciation, No. I ; United Brewery Workers Local, No. 24, of the City of New 
York; White Stone Workers, No. 41; Compact Labor Club; Machinists, No. 
401; Reliance Labor Club; Upholsterers' Union, Local 39, U. I. U. of N. Y.; 
Plumbers and Gasfitters, Local No. 498, N. Y. ; Bricklayers' Union, No. 35; 
Typographical Union, No. 6; Central Federated Union; Local 476, U. B. of 
C. & J. of America; Local 37s, Carpenters & Joiners of America, 243-47; 
Sheep Butchers' Protective Union, Local No. 10, B. B. W. of America; 
Carpenters' Local Union, 309, U. B. of C; United Brotherhood of Carpenters 
and Joiners of America; District Assembly, No. 220, Knights of Labor, this 
organization numbers over 10,000 members; New York State Brotherhood of 
Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen; New York State Allied Printing Trades 
Council; Amalgamated Association of Street and Electrical Railway Em- 
ployees of America; Auburn Trades Assembly; Oneida Trades and Labor 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 551 

Assembly; Norwich Trades Assembly; Jamestown Central Labor Council; 
Batavia Trades Council; Local 497 United Brotherhood of Carpenters and 
Joiners of America; Wine, Liquor and Beer Dealers' Association, 28th Dis- 
trict; United Brotherhood of Carpenters, Local 382; Local 724 of the United 
Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners; L. U. 848, Brotherhood Painters, Dec. 
and P. of America; Indorsed by L. N., No. 11, A. S. M. W. I. A.; Tex- 
tile Workers' Industrial Union of U. S. ; Inside Electrical Workers of 
Greater New York; Piano Makers' Union, Local 16; Longshoremen's Union 
Protective Association, Branch No. 4; New York District Council, Brother- 
hood of Painters, of the City of New York; Workingmen's Federation, New 
York State; International Brotherhood of Teamsters' Joint Council; Asso- 
ciation of Janitors and Engineers; The Workmen's Educational Association; 
Metal Spinners of New York and Vicinity; Troy Trades Assembly. 

SIMILAR RESOLUTIONS WERE PASSED BY 

Central Flatbush Taxpayers' Association; Taxpayers' and Rentpayers' As- 
sociation of the 30th and 31st Wards, Brooklyn; East Morrisania Taxpayers' 
or Property Owners' Association; Third Ward Property Owners' Association, 
Bronx; The Heights Taxpayers' Association, Bronx, endorses the " Equal 
Pay Bill " supported by the Interborough Association of Women Teachers 
and asks the Legislature to pass, and the Mayor and the Governor to ap- 
prove the same; Ocean Hill Board of Trade; 24th Ward Board of Trade; 
The Grand Street Board of Trade, Brooklyn; West End Board of Trade, 
Brooklyn; Ridgewood Board oi' Trade; N. Y. District Council, Brotherhood 
of Painters, of the City of New York; The 26th Ward Board of Trade, 
Brooklyn, endorses the " Equal Pay Bill " supported by the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers and asks the Legislature to pass, and the 
Mayor and the Governor to approve the same; Grocery Clerks, No. 1100; 
Retail Clerks, No. 1132; Engineers, No. 56; Engineers, No. 319; Elevators' 
Conductors, No. 2; Electrical Workers, inside; Electrical Workers, No. 270; 
Electrical Workers, No. 419; Electrical Workers, No. 522; Flour & Cereal, 
No. 3; Foundry Employees, No. 9; Marine Firemen; Flint Glass Workers, 
No. i; Glass Bottle Blowers, No. 52; Flint Glass, No. 69; United Hatters, 
No. 7; United Hatters, No. 8; Horse Shoers, No. 7; Plumbers' Laborers, 
No. 155; Moulders, No. 445; Moulders, No. 22; Moulders, No. 96; Musi- 
cians, No. 310; Metal Polishers, No. 12; Mailers, No. 6; Mailers, No. 9463; 
Teamsters, No. 375; Teamsters, No. 499; Teamsters, No. 592; Teamsters, No. 
763; Teamsters' Milk Routemen's LTnion; Typographical, No. 6; Uphol- 
sterers, No. 121; Waiters, No. 2; Wood Workers, No. 249; Bartenders, No. 
70; Wire Weavers; Actors' Union, No. 2; Bookkeepers and Accountants; 
Bill Posters, No. 33; Boot & Shoe Workers, No. 160; Brush Makers, No. 
6; Brewery Workers, No. 59; Pipe Caulkers & Tappers; Calcium Light 
Operators, No. 35; Cigar Makers, No. 37; Cigar Makers, No. 87; Clothing 
Cutters, No. s; Street Car Employees, No. 283; Metropolitan Association 
of Retail Druggists; The -New York Branch of the American Pharmaceutical 
Association; Hudson River Pharmaceutical Association; The Manhattan Phar- 
maceutical Association; New York German Apothecary Association; Uphol- 
sterers, No. 3. 

Resolved, That this Association known as Sheet Metal Workers, L. U. 
No. II of the City of New York endorse the amendment to the Davis Law 
known as " The Teachers' Equal Pay Bill." 

Manhattan Lodge, I. A. of M. 
Local No. 402 of the City of New York, 

CARRIAGE AND WAGON WORKERS INTERNATIONAL UNION 

It is one of our fundamental principles that women should receive equal 
pay for equal work. 

I wish to state personally that I will do anything in my power to aid you 



553 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

in getting " The Teachers' Equal Pay Bill " made a law. I am writing a 
letter to the Senator and Assemblyman from this district asking them to 
give it their support, and I will endeavor to have some of my friends from 
this district (the ssth Assem.) to do the same. 

If I can aid you in any other manner, if you will me know in what way, 
I will be only too glad to do so, and will feel it an honor if I can be of 
assistance to your organization in the slightest degree. 

John D. Atherton, Sec. No. %. 

March 9, 1908. 

Hon. Michael J. Flaherty, ex-Sheriff; Charles E. Gehring. 

New York, March 23, 1908. 
The Taxpayers Alliance, 

Hon. A. C. Hottenroth, President. 

My Dear Sir. — According to motion prevailing at the last regular meeting 
of the Alliance, referring the matter of the Davis Bill, or Equal Pay Bill, 
to the Local Associations, I would respectfully state that the delegates from 
the Bedford Park Taxpayers' Association to your honorable body, were in- 
structed to oppose the measure, at your special meeting on Wednesday 
evening, 25th inst. 

As I, personally, am in favor of equal pay for equal work, and feeling 
that the opposition shown at the meeting of the B. Pk. Taxpayers' Associa- 
tion, did not voice the sentiment of our membership (there being but about 
one-fifth present) I would strenuously protest again my name being used as 
an opponent to the measure, and if any record is kept of the friends of the 
movement, I wish my name recorded among them. 

No plausible reason ,has, as yet, been brought out why the Governor should 
not sign the bill, excepting that the applicants are women. 

No self-respecting man, if he loves his mother, would advance such a 
reason. 

We are living in a free and enlightened country (not a monarchy) where 
all are equal, and where the services of one, male or female, should be 
worth the same as another, particularly in our school system, in parallel 
grades. 

With assurances of my esteem, 

I am yours very truly, 

Daniel A. McCormick. 

N. B. — I would add. that no notice of this special business, was sent to the 
members of the B. P. T. Assn. D. A. McC. 

The following business firms have formally endorsed our Equal Pay Bill: 
Abraham & Straus; A. Alexander; Arnold & Co.; H. M. Baum; Ludwig, 
Bauman & Co.; L. M. Blumstein; Bonwit, Teller & Co.; Buckley-Newhall 
Co.; Alfred Cammeyer; John Daniell Sons & Sons; Frazin & Oppenheim & 
Co.; Fisher Bros.; Greenhut & Co.; Hackett, Carhart & Co.; Kalmus Bros.; 
Thomas Kellj'; Klauber Bros. & Co.; E. C. Batten; W. L. Boyde; John 
Wanamaker; Koch & Sons; James McCreery & Co.; Mahler Bros.; T. A. & 
L. Y. Newman; O'Neill-Adams Co.; John D. O'Neill & Sons; Oppenheim, 
Collins & Co.; P. Morton Oppenheim & Co.; J. Parsleys Sons; M. Philipsborn 
Co.; Saks & Co.; Simpson, Crawford Co.; The 14th Street Store; A. A. 
Vantine; John B. Van Wagenen; Young Bros.; Bloomingdale Bros. 

CLUBS— POLITICAL 

INDEPENDENCE LEAGUE 

Whereas, The Independence League stands for the principle of " Equal 

rights for all and special privileges to none "; and 

Whereas, The Interborough Association of Women Teachers are now 
The communcations oi' the Interborough Association of Women Teachers 

receive " equal pay for equal work "; and 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 553 

Whereas, We believe that when the same requirements are fulfilled, the 
same examination passed and the same positions assigned, the same remunera- 
tion should be received, regardless of sex; therefore, be it 

Resolved, That the Independence League of the Twenty-second Assembly 
District, County of Kings, endorse the amendment to the Davis Law, known 
as the " Teachers' Equal Pay Bill," as the amendment proposes to establish 
the principle that the .position — not the sex — shall carry the salary; also be it 

Resolved, That copies of the resolution be forwarded to Governor Hughes, 
and the Senator and Assemblyman of the loth Senatorial District, and 22d 
Assembly District. 

S. J. Trapanic, Secretary, 
Alfred Hughes, Leader. 

A similar resolution was passed by the Tamaror Club, and signed by Ros- 
well D. Williams, Peter J. Falligan, John T. Maquire, John S. Dunn, Jr., 
John M. Wilson, David W. Dowling. 

Also by the Seneca Club: George E. LaMont, Secretary; James I. Atchison, 
president, and forwarded with following letter: 

New York, March 6, 1908. 
The endorsement of the Women Teachers' Equal Pay Bill passed unani- 
mously last evening at the meeting of the Seneca Club, which is the Demo- 
cratic political club of the Twenty-fifth Assembly District, Manhattan. 

The endorsement was unanimous and many kind words were spoken in 
behalf of the women teachers in their fight for equal pay rights. 
With best wishes for your success, 

James I. Atchison, President, 
George E. La Mont, Secretary, 
Geo. F. Scannell. 

Your communication of the 19th inst. addressed to the Queens County 
Republican Committee, requesting the endorsement of that organization, was 
received, and on motion it was referred to the Legislative Committee, which 
is the customary action in such matters. That committee has given your 
matter its consideration and heartily endorses your petition, and at the next 
regular meeting will report its action to the whole committee, which will, no 
doubt, confirm the endorsement. 

Assuring you of my best wishes for the success of your undertaking, I 
remain, 

Mar. 21, 1908. John D. McEwen, 

Chairman of Legislative Committee. 

The communications of the Interborough Association of Women Teachers' 
recently addressed to Congressman William S. Bennet, were personally pre- 
sented by him to the Republican District Committee of the Nineteenth As- 
sembly District Borough of Manhattan, at its last meeting; whereupon a 
resolution was offered and unanimously carried, whereby said District Com- 
mittee placed itself on record as favoring the passage of the bill now in the 
Legislature, which provides among other things, that where men and women 
are appointed to positions of the same grade or rank, that they shall receive 
the same pay. 

Andrew F. Murray, 
Chairman of the Nineteenth Assembly District. 

March 3, 1908. 

Dear Madam. — This is to certify that the members of the North End 
Democratic Club of the 35th Assembly District have approved and endorsed 
the resolutions of the Women Teachers' Association for equal pay for equal 
work. 

Daniel A. McCormick, Secretary. 

The Patrick F. Lynch Democratic Association of the Twenty-third Assem- 
bly District unanimously endorsed the McCarren Bill, increasing the teachers' 
salaries. 



554 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

The Amsterdam Democratic Club, at a regular meeting held at its Chib 
House and Auditorium, at No. 131 West 64th street. New York, N. Y., the 
20th day of December, 1909, on motion 01' Hon. John B. Adger Mullally, 
which was duly seconded by Hon. Joseph Gordon and others and unanimously 
carried. 

Resolved, That the Amsterdam Democratic Club is in most hearty sympathy 
with the Interborough Association of Women Teachers in its effort to secure 
some measure of justice for Women Teachers, especially in respect to the 
matter of their inadequate, unfair and unequal compensation; and that this 
Club, recognizing the great debt, which can not be measured in material 
terms, due to the women who teach our little ones, wishes the officers and 
members of the Women Teachers' Association Godspeed in their undertakings 
and God's richest blessings individually and collectively. 

Attest: Albert E. Walker, Secretary. 

Whereas, The Socialist party the world over stands for the principle of 
equal rights, without distinction as to color, creed or sex, and 

Whereas, In matters of education we demand that the State should afford 
to every child the opportunity for harmonious development of all its facul- 
ties, therefore be it 

Resolved, That we heartily endorse the struggle of the women teachers of 
the City of New York in their demand of " Equal Pay for Equal Work " ; 

Resolved, That we stand ready to co-operate with any movement honestly 
endeavoring to bring our educational system nearer to our ideal of true 
education. 

Approved at the regular meeting of the Executive Committee, S. P., Local 
New York, March 23, igo8. 

Attest: Moses Oppenheimer, 
Francis M. Gill, 

Sub-Committee of the Executive Committee. 

SIMILAR RESOLUTIONS WERE PASSED BY: 

Tammany Hall General Committee, 30th Assembly District, Wm. J. Sinnott, 
Executive Member; The John F. Curry Association of the City of New York; 
Progress Republican Club; The Jefferson Club, sth Assembly District, Brook- 
lyn; ^tna Club of Brooklyn; Alpha Republican Club, 15th Assembly District, 
Brooklyn; Jeffersonian Democratic Club; Manhattan Single Tax Club; Mount 
Morris Democratic Club; East Side Clinic for Children, Adelaide Waller- 
stein, M. D., President; East Side Clinic; Columbus Lodge No. 24, Order of 
True Friends; Arbeiter Maenerchor, N. Y. ; Maenerchor Des Mobelarbeiter, 
243-247 East 84th St., Manhattan; Socialistic Liedertafel, N. Y. 

THE " EQUAL PAY " BILL WAS ALSO ENDORSED BY: 

Sterling Republican Club, Manhattan; Bedford Political Equality League; 
Queens County Democratic Central Committee; The North End Democratic 
Association of the Bronx, 35th Assembly District; Pensa Club; Bushwick 
Political Equality Club; President Rubinstein Club; 6th Assembly District 
Democratic Club; P. F. Lynch, 23d Assembly District Club; Independence 
League, 12th Assembly District; Independence League, First Assembly Dis- 
trict; Independence League, Fourth Assembly District; Interborough Council 
(consists of Presidents of Borough Teachers' Associations) ; Jackson Associa- 
tion, 34th Assembly District; 18th Assembly District Republican Club; Seneca 
Club of Kings County; Wampanoag Club, 32d Assembly District; Jefferson 
Club, sth Assembly District; Third Ward Republican Club; Independence 
League, 20th District; South Brooklyn Republican Club; Court Vittorio 
Emanuele II, N. 435 F. or A.; Arthur H'. Murphy Association, Bronx (34th 
Assembly District); St. Veronica C. Club, 451 Hudson St., City of New 
York; Kings County Democratic Party, First Assembly District; Kings County 
Political Equality League. 



PART SIX— CHAPTER ONE 

DOCUMENTS 

To the Members of the Charter Revision Commission,'. 
Hon. William M. Ivins, Chairman. 

Sirs. — The twelve thousand members oi the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers of the City of New York, representing every grade and 
department of the public school service from kindergarten to district superin- 
tendent, inclusive, is unanimous in its petition that you recommend such a 
revision of the Chapter on Education as will secure: 

A. — Salary for position, regardless of sex of incumbent; 

B. — State protection of minimum salaries; 

C. — Greater minimum than " three mills " as required in Section 1064 of 
the Charter. 



C. — Greater Minimum than "Three Mills" as Required in Section 1064 
OF the Charter 

In connection with request " C," we beg you to consider the following 
extract from "Memorandum on Senate Bill 1218" (familiarly known as the 
" White Bill " or the " Teachers' Equal Pay Bill ") submitted to Governor 
Hughes by Horace E. Deming: 

" The State has never hesitated, either in New York or in the other 
States of the Union, to take effective measures to compel a given locality to 
raise by taxation sufficient funds to maintain a proper system of education. 
When the State standard of what should be expended for education, in view 
of the general interests of the public,' is higher than the local standard the 
locality sometimes fails to raise enough money by taxation to support the 
schools according to the State standard. To meet this niggardliness on the 
part of the local taxing officers, resort is sometimes had to the conferring of 
direct powers of taxation on boards of education, or to mandatory legislation 
directing that such and such a per cent, of the annual tax levy in the locality 
shall be devoted to school purposes. 

" When the Greater City of New York was created the experiment was 
tried of having the Board of Estimate and Apportionment act upon the bud- 
get which the Board of Education prepared, setting forth the needs of the 
department of education. Experience soon made it clear that the Board oi' 
Estimate and Apportionment would not willingly allow a sufficient sum ade- 
quately to support education in New York. The Legislature was compelled, 
therefore, to state a minimum figure and to order that at least that amount 
should be collected in the City of New York and devoted to the pvirposes of 
education. This is the origin of the four-mill provision contained in the 
so-called Davis Law of 1900, now incorporated in section 1064 of the New 
York Charter. 

" When the City authorities announced that property in New York would 
thereafter be assessed at one hundred per cent, of its market value, it was 
thought that the four-mill provision would produce more money than was 
needed, and the City authorities asked the Legislature, therefore, to reduce 
the four mills to three. This was done in 1903. But the raising of the 
assessed values to one hundred per cent, of the market value never really 
materialized, and the three-mill provision has proved insufficient." 

Hence our request for the restoration of the fourth mill. 

555 



556 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

II 

B — State Protection of Minimum Salaries 

In connection with request " B," we ask you to consider that the State 
in its Constitution makes mandatory the establishing of common schools and 
the education of its children therein. We believe, therefore, that the State 
should also make mandatory the minimum wage to be paid its servants in 
this department. 

It is within the memory of every member of your Honorable Body that 
prior to the enactment of the " Davis Law," teachers could not know from 
year to year, sometimes even from month to month, what salaries they would 
receive, the demands of Dock, Bridge, Street, Police, Fire and other depart- 
ments always being considered superior to those of teachers' salaries. It is 
evident that teachers cannot do their best work under such conditions. It is 
useless for them to plan to improve themselves by study, as they cannot be 
sure of being financially able to carry out said plans. The great strides 
forward which the teachers of our city have made since the State has pro- 
tected them in minimum salaries are patent to all acquainted with our school 
system. 

The following extracts from the " Memorandum in Support of Senate 
Bill 1218 " submitted to Governor Hughes by Horace E. Deming are convinc- 
ing on this point: 

Page 4: " From time immemorial education has been in the special care 
of the State. Education is a State function. No State in the Union has 
ever surrendered this function, or has abdicated the right to exercise the 
function. 

" The Constitution of the State of New York, in Article IX, declares that 
the Legislature shall provide for the maintenance and support of a system of 
free common schools wherein all the children of this State may be educated — 
all the children of this State; not some of them, but all of them." 

Page 5: "The Gunnison case, decided by the Court of Appeals in 1903 
(176 N. Y., 11), states very clearly the precise legal status of the Board of 
Education. The decision is by a unanimous court, consisting of Chief Judge 
Parker and Judges Gray, Barlett, Haight, Cullen, Werner and O'Brien, 
unanimously affirming a decision of the Appellate Division, Second Depart- 
ment, made by Goodrich, P. J., and Bartlett, Woodward, Jenks and H'irsch- 
berg, JJ., Justice Hirschberg writing the opinion at the Appellate Division 
and Justice O'Brien in the Court of Appeals." 

Extract from said opinion: " It is apparent from the general drift of the 
argument that the learned counsel for the defendant is of the opinion that 
the employment of the teachers in the public schools and the general con- 
duct and management of the schools is a city function, in the same sense 
as it is in the case of the care of the streets or the employment of police 
and the payment of their salaries and compensation. But that view of the 
relations of the City to public education, if entertained, is an obvious mis- 
take." — " These corporate powers are expressly conferred upon this defendant 
by the City Charter (Section 1062) . . . The only purpose for which the 
defendant was created a corporate body was to conduct a system of public 
education in a designated division of the State, and manage and control the 
schools therein. This obviously includes the employment and payment of 
teachers, and none of these powers or functions are conferred upon the City 
as such." 

We believe the above justifies our appeal i'or State protection of minimum 
salaries. 

Ill is included in Part I. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 557 



ANSWER TO MAYOR McCLELLAN'S VETO MESSAGE ON SENATE 

BILL 1218 

SUMMARY OF OBJECTIONS 

1. Bill is mandatory and places enormous expense on the taxpayers. 

2. Local authorities have the powers the bill gives them. 

3. The bill is class legislation pure and simple. 

4. The bill destroyes the elasticity oi The present school system. 

Any unprejudiced student of Senate Bill 1218 must acknowledge that it is 
mandatory in a far less degree than Section 1091 of the Charter which it 
seeks to amend. 

In eliminating all definite and distinct schedules it leaves the making of 
salary schedules entirely to the Board of Education, stipulating only some 
broad general principles, which have been generally recognized as just and 
practical. 

Therefore, inasmuch as this bill restores in great measure, the " Home 
Rule," taken from the city by the enactment of the Davis Law in 1900, it 
would seem the part of wisdom and good citizenship to assist in this res- 
toration. 

" The enormous expense to the taxpayers " is fully covered by the " four 
mill provision" (page 7, lines 1-6). The Davis Law (1900) contained this 
identical provision. In 1902, the Board of Education asked the Legislature 
to reduce the " four " to " three," because it estimated that a three mill 
fund would be suificient if Controller Grout's plan to assess taxes on a hun- 
dred per cent, valuation should be carried out. Since this " par vafue " 
plan never materialized, it is only fair to restore the " mill " taken away 
from the teachers' salary fund, in anticipation thereof. 

SECOND OBJECTION 

" Local authorities have the powers the bill gives them." 
The local authorities, as represented in the Board of Education, refused 
to grant the principle that women employed in the same grade should be 
paid under the same schedule. Hence the appeal to " Albany." Further- 
more, the local authorities have not the power to amend the ' charter of the 
City of New York and remove therefrom the words " male " and " female " 
as applied to teachers. Previous to the passage of the Davis Law there was 
no discrimination in salaries on account of sex, in the school systems of 
Brooklyn and other parts of the present City of New York. Should not the 
Legislature, therefore, be permitted to make restitution to the citizens it then 
injured? 

THIRD OBJECTION 

" The bill is class legislation favoring certain grades of women." 
It is a deplorable fact that the " local authorities " seem unable to state 
the facts in this connection. 

Mr. Stern, representing the Board ol' Education at a hearing on this bill 
before the Assembly Cities Committee on April 23. 1907, said there was a 
man teacher in the lA grade receiving $2,160. At the hearing before Mr. 
McClellan, Monday May 6, 1907, the said Mr. Stern, representing the said 
Board of Education, read a letter from Mr. Maxwell, City Superintendent, 
in which Mr. Maxwell referred to the 519 men from the 2B through the 6B. 
Out of their own mouths, therefore, have the opponents of the bill — and 
Mr. McClellan bases his veto on their arguments and their estimates — con- 
demned their own arguments on class legislation and discrimination against 
primary teachers to ridicule and scorn. Yet notwithstanding the above state- 
ments that there are men all through the grades from lA upwards, and not- 
withstanding the fact that the White Bill provides for equal salaries for men 
and women employed in any one schedule, these opponents, determined to 



558 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

defeat " the women " at any cost, claim that the bill favors " women in 
certain grades and not in others." 

In this connection, the Mayor also writes, " but in those grades where 
there are no men the salaries remain unchanged." It seems pitiable that a 
man holding the high office of executive in the largest city in America should 
exhibit either such gross carelessness or ignorance. The bill distinctly pro- 
vides changes in the salaries of women " in those grades where there are 
no men " by raising the present first year minimum oi' from $600 to $720, 
and by reducing the period of serving for a maximum from 17 years to 12 
years. Furthermore, should the Mayor's Board of Education acting under 
the White Bill if enacted into law, fail to use some of the money provided 
by the additional mill, in raising the maximum salaries in such grades, it 
would be guilty of misuse of the powers conferred upon it, and another ap- 
peal to Albany would be justified. 

In this arguments, the Mayor cancels his first objection with his third, 
and reduces both to zero. Proof: In expanding on his first objection he sets 
forth the $9,000,000 estimate set forth by the Men Principals' and Teachers' 
Association, and the Board of Education. (No disrespect is meant by thus 
placing the Board second. It is done to indicate that the information re- 
ceived is that neither the Board of Education nor the Board of Estimate has 
made any official estimate and that the figures quoted by the opponents 01' 
the bill and by the Mayor were largely compiled by a volunteer force of 
male principals and teachers who were permitted access to the records by 
the Board of Education). Now this $9,000,000 estimate is obtained by as- 
summing that the Board will pay all the teachers from the kindergarten 
through the 8A grade under the $900, $2,160 schedule. Therefore, there can 
be no " class legislation " considered. For if the " equalizing " is to affect 
simply the women working in schedules secured by the Davis Law to male 
teachers, only positions above the 6B grade should be used in the " equaliz- 
ing estimate," and even the figures of our opponents make this estimate 
only $1,858,035. So, it clearly appears that "class legislation" and "$9,000,- 
000 " invalidate objections one and three. 

Continuing on this line, a line which the opponents of this bill have found 
most effective because by it they have misled a few " primary teachers," the 
Mayor cites more of the estimates submitted by the Male Principals' and 
Teachers' Association, and says there are " about 6,500 teachers from lA to 
4B " and " according to provisions of this law the salaries of the 5,000 
women teachers in the first eight grades will remain unchanged, inasmuch 
as there are no men serving in those schedules." If as quoted above there 
are about 6,500 teachers in grades from lA to 4B, and if 5,000 oi' them 
are women, is it not reasonable to suppose that the other 1,500 are men? 
But Mr. Maxwell says, " 519 men from 2B to 6B." Again Mr. Maxwell's 
latest annual report shows only 1,701 men in the entire system. So the 
answer to the problem: Find the number of women in the first eight grades, 
is, if based on the foregoing figures, Reductio ad absurdatn, and therefore any 
arguments based thereon are absurd. 

FOURTH OBJECTION 

" The Bill would destroy in a large measure the elasticity of the present 
system and thus seriously impair the efficiency of the service. At present, 
as there is no dift'erence in salary between the various grades up to 7A it is 
possible to assign the various teachers to those grades below 7A for which 
they are best fitted." 

The proponents of the bill challenge any one to find in Senate Bill 12 18 
any provision which prevents the Board of Education from making the same 
salary schedule cover all the " various grades up to 7A." The proponents 
know that no such provision can be found in the bill, hence objection four is 
also absurd. 

The Mayor's message, in connection with his veto of Senate Bill 1218, is 
conspicuously like the 9rgument made by Mr. Stern at the hearing May 6, 




Hon. Arthur S. Somers, 

Father of "Equal Pay" Resolution in Board of Education, 

Dec. 22, 1909. 



'EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 559 

1907. A search oi' the "minutes of the Legislative hearings" of 1900 would 
disclose that Mr. Stern's arguments in opposing the Davis Bill were no 
more reliable or logical than are those he uses in opposing the White Bill. 
Then he estimated that a teacher's salary under the Davis Law would be- 
come $13,500, and that the cost of the Davis Law to the city would be 
$26,000,000. 

Knowing, as he so well does, that the present Schedule VI, in so far 
as it affects the salary of a male teacher in any grade below the 7A, beyond 
assuring said male teacher of an initial salary of $900 and an annual incre- 
ment of $105, is not protected by law, and can be changed at any meeting 
of the Board of Education, Mr. Stern nevertheless makes an arbitary and 
wholly unauthorized division between the 4A and 4B grades, and contem- 
plates paying all teachers down through the 4B a salary of $2160 after 12 
years of service, thus forecasting an average annual increase of 56%, and 
further contemplates when he pleads for the " primary teachers " — not, mind 
you, when he hold up $9,000,000, to the taxpayers — leaving the maximum of 
$1240 for teachers below the 4B iinchanged. Is it surprising in the i'ace of 
such decisions that out of 66 cases in which teachers have appealed to the 
courts, from the decisions of the Committee on By-Laws and Legislation — of 
which Mr. Stern is the most conspicuous member — that upwards of 62 have 
been won by the teachers? Is it not sad, however, that teachers should be 
obliged to spend upwards of a hundred thousand dollars to get through the 
Courts of Justice the rights which their employer, the City, through its Board 
of Education, denies them? 

AN ACT 

To amend the Greater New York charter in relation to the fixing and regu- 
lating of the salaries of members of the supervising and the teaching 
staff of the public schools in the city oi' New York, and to the general 
school fund. 
The People of the State of New York represented in Senate and Assembly 
do enact as follows: 
Section i. Section ten hundred and ninety-one of the Greater New York 
charter, as re-enacted by chapter four hundred and sixty-six of the laws of 
nineteen hundred and one is hereby amended to read as follows: 

Board of Education; Power to Fix Salaries; Method; Regulating, 
1091. The Board of Education shall subject to the following rules and 
regulation have power to adopt and shall adopt by-laws, fixing and regulating 
the salaries of all members of the supervising and the teaching staff of the 
public schools in the City of New York and establishing schedules of such 
salaries. 

1. The salaries of men and women in the supervising and teaching staff 
(and the salaries of all principals and teachers) shall be -fixed and regulated 
by merit, grade of class taught, length of service and experience in teaching 
or supervising (only a combination of these considerations) and no discrimina- 
tion or difference in the amount of salary paid men and women shall be 
made on account of their difference in sex; 

2. The schedules of salaries shall be uniform (such by-laws shall establish 
a uniform schedule oi' salaries for the supervising and the teaching staff) 
throughout all boroughs; (which schedule shall provide for an equal annual 
increasement, etc., etc., as in 

3. The first year's salary of a member of the teaching staff shall not be 
less than seven httndred and twenty dollars; 

4. No member of the teaching staff shall suffer a reduction of salary be- 
cause of his or her transfer from an elementary school to a high school or 
a training school; 

5. The difference between the yearly salary of a teacher of a boys' class 
and that of a teacher of a girls' class of corresponding grade who have had 
the same number of years teaching experience shall not exceed one hundred 
and eighty dollars; 



56o EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

6. Each schedule shall establish an initial minimum annual salary and 
equal annual increments thereafter not to exceed twelve until the maximum 
annual salary prescribed in the schedule shall be attained and no such incre- 
ment shall be less than the smallest annual increment paid to male teachers 
in the public elementary schools in the City of New York at the time of the 
passage of this act; 

7. All increases in the salary of a member of the supervising or the teach- 
ing staff shall cease with the fifth year and again with the ninth year pf 
the member's service unless and until the service of such member shall have 
been approved after inspection and investigation as meritorious and fit by 
a majority of a board consisting of the district superintendent assigned to 
the district or school in which such member is serving and the member^ b/ 
the board of superintendents, and in every such case said board so con- 
stituted as aforesaid shall approve or disapprove at least forty days before 
the date when the increase of salary conditioned upon said board's approval 
will be due, (provided, however, that none of the aforesaid members of 
the supervising and teaching staff of any of 

Take in pp. s, 6, 7 to and including " per annum " 1.14, p. 7, but omitting 
all italicized words and sentences and all bracket signs except the bracket 
sign after said "per annum") 

8. Each member of the supervising and the teaching staff shall, under the 
by-laws adopted in conformity with the provisions of this section, at once 
have all the rights to which such member is entitled by reason of merit, 
grade of class taught, length of service, and experience in teaching or super- 
vising; 

9. The board of examiners shall issue to a principal who has or a teacher 
who has had experience in schools other than the public schools (oi*) in the 
City of New York, a certificate stating (that the experience of such teacher 
is equivalent to a certain) the number of years of service and the experi- 
ence in the elementary , or as the case may be, in the high or training schools 
in (of) the city to which the service and experience of the holder of the 
certificate is equivalent and such certificate shall be final and conclusive as 
to the rating of the holder thereof for length of service and experience on 
becoming a member of the supervising or the teaching staff of the irublie 
schools in the City of New York; (the board of examiners shall 

Take in i. i. 20-26 p. 6 and to and including "in such certificates" on 1. 6 
P. 8.) 

10. No salary (now paid to) of any member of the supervising or (and) 
the teaching staff of (any of) the public schools in the City of New York 
at the time this act goes into effect and who continue such member Hheri- 
after shall be reduced by the operation of this section. 

(and the aforesaid annual equal increment for each etc. etc. etc. take in 
1. I. 10-16, p. 8, omitting italicized words and bracket signs.) 

The board of estimate and apportionment of the City of New York shall 
appropriate for the general school fund for the year nineteen hundred and 
nine and annually for each year thereafter an amount equivalent to not less 
than four mills on every dollar of assessed valuation of the real and per- 
sonal estate in the City of New York liable to taxation; and at least ninety- 
three percentum of the amount appropriate for the general school shall be 
set aside for the payment of the salaries of the members of the supervising 
and the teaching staff of the regular public day schools in the City of New 
York. 

2. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent with the provisions of this act 
are hereby repealed. 

3. This act shall take eft'ect January first nineteen hundred and nine. 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 561 

THE DAVIS-SMITH BILL— 1909 



To establish uniform compensation to all holding appointments after com- 
petitive examination, in the several departments of government. 

The People of the state of New York represented in the Senate and As- 
sembly do enact as follows: 

Section i. In all state, county, and municipal departments of government, 
there shall be but one salary for one and the same position whose incum- 
bent is appointed from an eligible list after competitive examination. 

Section 2. All acts and parts of acts in so far as inconsistent with this 
act are hereby repealed. 

Section 3. This act shall take effect October first, one thousand nine 
hundred and nine. 

N. B.— Never reported out of committee. 

GLEDHILL-FOLEY BILL— 1909 



To amend the Greater New York charter, in relation to the fixing and 
regulating of the salaries of members of the supervising and the teaching 
staff of the public schools in the city of New Work, and to the general 
school fund. 

The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and As- 
sembly, do enact as follows: 

Section i. Section ten hundred and ninety-one of the Greater New York 
charter, as re-enacted by chapter four hundred and sixty-six of the laws of 
nineteen hundred and one, is hereby amended to read as follows: 

Board of Education: Power to Fix Salaries; Method; Regulating. 

Sec. logi The board of education shall subject to the following rules and 
restrictions have power to adopt and shall adopt by-laws fixing and regulat- 
ing the salaries of all members of the supervising and the teaching staff of 
the public schools in the city of New York and establishing schedules of 
such salaries. 

There shall be a uniform schedule of salaries for the supervising and the 
teaching staff throughout all boroughs, providing for initial salaries and 
annual increment thereof as follows: 

I. In kindergartens and grades of the first six years, 

a. The initial salary of a teacher shall be: in a girls' class, seven hun- 
dred and twenty dollars per annum; in grades of the first and second 
years, in a boys' class, seven hundred and eighty dollars; in grades of the 
third and fourth years, in a mixed class, seven hundred and eighty dollars, 
and in a boys' class, eight hundred and fifty-two dollars; and in grades 
of the fifth and sixth years, in a mixed class, seven hundred and ninety- 
two dollars, and in a boys' class, nine hundred dollars; increasing by an- 
nual increments of seventy-five dollars until the thirteenth year, when the 
maximum shall be reached. 

b. The initial salary of an assistant to principal supervising grades of the 
first six years shall be: in a girls' school, eighteen hundred dollars; in a 
mixed school, nineteen hundred and forty dollars; and in a boys' school, 
twenty-one hundred dollars; increasing by annua! increments of one hun- 
dred fifty dollars until the third year, when the maximum shall be reached. 



562 EQUAL PAY TOR EQUAL WORK 

c. The initial salary of a principal of at least twenty classes in grades 
of the first six years shall be; in a girls' school, twenty-four hundred and 
fifty dollars; in a mixed school, twenty-six hundred dollars, and in a boys' 
school, twenty-seven hundred and fifty dollars; increasing by annual incre- 
ments of two hundred and fii'ty dollars until the fourth year, when the 
maximum shall be reached. 

2. In schools including or consisting of the grades of the seventh and 
eighth years. 

a. The initial salary of a teacher in grades of the seventh and eighth 
years shall be: in a girls' school, $1140; in a mixed school, $1290; and in 
a boys' school, $1440; increasing by annual increments of $150 until the 
third year, when the maximum shall be reached. 

b. The initial salary of an assistant to principal supervising in grades of 
the seventh and eighth years shall be: in a girls' school, $1950; in a mixed 
school, $2100; and in a boys' school, $2250; increasing by annual incre- 
ments of $150 until the third year, when the maximum shall be reached. 

c. The initial salary of a principal having twenty-five or more teachers 
in the grades of the seventh and eighth years shall be: in a girls' school, 
$2700; in a mixed school, $2850; and in a boys' school, $3000; increasing by 
annual increments of $250 until the fourth year, when the maximum shall 
be reached. 

3. In schools including or consisting of the seventh, eighth and ninth 
years, 

a. The initial salary of a teacher in the grades of the seventh, eighth 
and ninth years shall be; in a girls' school, $1140; in a mixed school, 
$1290; and in a boys' school, $1440; increasing by annual increments of 
$150 until the third year when the maximum shall be reached. 

b. The initial salary o£' an assistant to principal supervising in the grades 
of the seventh, eighth and ninth grades shall be; in a girls' school, $2150; 
in a mixed school, $2300; and in a boys' school, $2450; increasing by annual 
increments of $150 until the third year, when the maximum shall be 
reached. 

c. The initial salary of a principal having twenty-five or more teachers 
in the grades of the seventh, eighth and ninth years shall be: in a girls' 
school, $3200; in a mixed school $3350; and in a boys' school, $3500; 
increasing by annual increments of $250 until the third year, when the 
maximum shall be reached. 

4. In high schools and training schools for teachers, 

a. The initial salary of a junior teacher shall be: in a girls' school, 
$900; in a mixed school, $1000; and in a boys' school, $1100; increasing 
by annual increments of $100 until the third year, when the maximum 
shall be reached. 

b. The initial salary of an assistant teacher shall be: in a girls' school, 
$1250; in a mixed school, $1400; and in a boys' school, $1550; increasing 
by annual increments of $150 until the ninth year, when the maximum 
shall be reached. 

c. The initial salary of a first assistant shall be: in a girls' school $2600; 
in a mixed school, $2750; and in a boys' school, $2900; increasing by an- 
nual increments of $200 until the fourth year, when the maximum shall 
be reached. 

d. The salary of a principal supervising at least twenty-five teachers 
shall be $5000; of one supervising sixty or more teachers, not more than 
?5Soo. 

5. All increase in the salary of a member of the supervising or the 
teaching staff shall cease with the fii'th year and again with the ninth year 
of the member's service unless and until the service of such member shall 
have been approved after inspection and investigation as meritorious and 
fit by a majority of a board consisting of the district superintendent as- 
signed to the district or school in which such member is serving and the 
member of the board of superintendents, and in every such case said board so 
constituted as aforesaid shall approve or disapprove at least forty days 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 563 

before the date when the increase of salary conditioned upon said board's 
approval will be due. 

6. No salary of any member of the supervising or the teaching staff of 
the public schools in the city of New York shall be reduced by the opera- 
tion of these schedules; and this provision shall be construed to protect all 
salary contracts now in operation so that no losses shall ensue by reason 
of alteration oi' the annual increments; and it recommends, further, that 
each member of the supervising and the teaching staff shall at once be- 
come entitled to all the emolument in accordance with above schedule to 
which said person is entitled by reason of merit, experience, and position 
held; but the board of education may limit the expense of putting these 
schedules into effect by making the highest salary to be paid to any teacher 
or supervisor in the year 19 lo and each year thereafter until the maximum 
salary shall have been reached, the salary in the proposed schedule which 
is equal to or next higher than the amount that would be obtained by adding 
two of the annual increments in said schedule to the salary due said 
teacher or supervisor under the present schedule. 

7. Principals of elementary schools having at least twelve classes on the 
date of the adoption of these schedules shall receive all the emoluments 
and benefits of said schedule, but no principal of an elementary school 
appointed after such date shall receive the salary fixed by said schedules, 
except those in charge of schools having at least twenty classes. 

8. The board of estimate and apportionment of the city of New York 
shall appropriate i'or the general school fund for the year nineteen hundred 
and nine and annually for each year thereafter an amount equivalent to 
not less than four mills on every dollar of assessed valuation of the real 
and personal estate in the city of New York liable to taxation; and at 
least ninety-three per centum of the amount appropriated for the general 
school fund shall be set aside for the payment of the salaries of the mem- 
bers of the supervising and the teaching staff of the regular public day 
schools in the city of New York. 

9. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent with the provisions of this act 
are hereby repealed. 

10. This act shall take effect January first, nineteen hundred and ten. 

THAT PART OF REPORT OF THE CONCILIATION COMMITTEE 
NOT INCLUDED IN GLEDHILL-FOLEY BILL. 

The undersigned, acting individually, and not in any representative ca- 
pacity, as members of a committee which has had for its purpose the con- 
sideration and preparation of plans whereby the standards of education in 
this city may be advanced, and the many divergent and often opposing 
interests of the members of the teaching profession may be harmonized, 
and that this may be done without placing too heavy a burden upon the 
taxpayer, respectfully submit the following report: 

The committee approves a plan of organization which would confine 
the elementary school to the kindergarten and the grades of the first six 
years of the present elementary school course; would establish an inter- 
mediate school, called in the report the sub-high school, for the grades of 
the seventh, eighth and ninth years; and would limit the high school to 
grades of the tenth, eleventh and twelfth years. 

SPECIAL SALARY RECOMMENDATIONS 

The committee believes that an ideal school should be limited to 20 or 
30 classes and deplores the organization of excessively large schools; but 
it recognizes the necessity which demands these in many sections of this 
city and recommends that in recognition oi' the greater responsibility and 
the heavier burden an additional salary of not more than $500 per annum 
shall be paid to principals supervising sixty or more teachers. 



S64 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

After much consideration and discussion this committee has decided that, 
in view of the evident intention of the board of education to establish 
vocational schools in the very near future, and in view of the consequent 
necessity for a special adjustment of the salaries relating to special sub- 
jects, it is best at this time to recommend no definite salaries for directors, 
assistant directors, and teachers of special subjects; but this committee does 
recommend that there be revision of the present salary schedules of said 
directors, assistant directors, and teachers, and that the general plan of the 
schedule recommended above be followed in such revision. 

The committee recommends that the initial salary of a clerk in an 
elementary school shall be $600 per annum, increasing by annual incre- 
ments of $60 until the sixth year, when the maximum will be reached. 

The committee recommends that substitutes in elementary schools shall 
receive not less than $3 per diem. 

The committee recommends that the salary of no teacher shall be reduced 
by reason of transfer from elementary to sub-high, high, or training schools. 

GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS. 

The committee recommends the restoration of the " four mill tax." 

The committee recommends that all provisions relating to the tenure of 
office in the present charter be continued. 

The committee recommends that in the grades of the first six years the 
classes be mixed classes. 

The committee recommends that no salary of any member of the super- 
vising or the teaching staff of the public schools in the city of New York 
shall be reduced by the operation of these schedules; and this provision 
shall be construed to protect all salary contracts now in operation so that 
no losses shall ensue by reason of alteration of the annual increments; and 
it recommends, further, that each member of the supervising and the teach- 
ing staff shall at once become entitled to all the emolument in accordance 
with above schedule to which said person is entitled by reason of merit, 
experience, and position held; but the Board of Education may limit the 
expense of putting these schedules into effect by making the highest salary 
to be paid to any teacher or supervisor in the year 1910 and each year 
thereafter until the maximum salary shall have been reached, the salary 
in the proposed schedule which is equal to or next higher than the amount 
that would be obtained by adding two of the annual increments in said 
schedule to the salary due said teacher or supervisor under the present 
schedule. 

The committee recommends that principals of elementary schools having 
at least twelve classes on the date of the adoption of these schedules shall 
receive all the emoluments and benefits of said schedule; but no principal 
of an elementary school appointed after such date shall receive the salary 
fixed by said schedules, except those in charge of schools having at least 
twenty classes. 

The committee recommends that such changes be made in the pension 
law as will do equal justice to all members of the teaching and super- 
vising force. 

The committee recommends that the present charter provisions for deter- 
mining fitness and merit of teachers shall be retained in full force and 
effect. 

The committee recommends that from time to time and in such sub- 
high schools as the school authorities may deem expedient there may be 
established industrial or vocational courses in addition to the regular course 
leading to the high school and college. 

The members of the committee deem it proper to state that they have 
held many sessions of protracted length since December 18, 1908, during 
which every pertinent phase of the question under discussion was thor- 
oughly considered, with the foregoing results. They further deem it proper 
to note that Mr. Magnus Gross and Mr. James J. Sheppard have been 



EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 565 

members of this committee and have participated in Its deliberations, but 
resigned before the completion of its work. 

The signatures of the committee do not necessarily mean that each mem- 
ber is entirely in favor of every detail of the report; and some may not 
have felt themselves competent to judge in instances where knowledge of 
technicalities was demanded; but they do mean that the committee believe 
that the report expresses the best method of conciliating the teachers of 
the city and that the committee feel strongly that conciliation is absolutely 
necessary for the good of the schools. 

March 2, 1909. 

Respectfully submitted, 
(Sd.) Katharine D, Blake. 
(Sd.) Charles O. Dewey. 
(Sd.) W. B. Gunnison. 
(Sd.) Katharine A. McCann. 
(Sd.) Annie B. Moriarity. 
(Sd.) IVEary Moore Orr. 
(Sd.) Frank K. Perkins. 
(Sd.) Mariam Sutro Price. 
(Sd.) Grace C. Strachan. 
(Sd.) J. Edw. Swanstkom. 
(Sd.) Kate E. Turner, Secretary, 
(Sd.) Henry N. Tifft, Chairman. 

Under Section 44, 3A of the By-Laws of the Board of Education, the 
following permission had to be obtained: 

May 8, 1909. 
Miss Grace C. Strachan, 
No. 1308 Pacific St., 
Brooklyn, N. Y. 
Dear Madam: 

In accordance with your request, permission is hereby granted to you 
to attend the hearing on the Gledhill-Foley bill before his Honor, the 
Mayor, on Tuesday, May 11, 1909, at ten o'clock a. m. 
Very truly yours, 

Egerton L. Winthrop, Jr., 
President, Board of Education. 
By-Laws, Board of Education: 

Sec. 44, sub. 3A. Absence from duty on the part of the City Super- 
intendent of Schools, any Associate Superintendent or District Superin- 
tendent, or any other member of the supervising or teaching staff, or any 
member of the board of Examiners, or other salaried oiificer or employee of 
the Board of Education, for the purpose of advocating or opposing any 
legislative or other measure or proposition affecting the public schools or 
the public school system, before any official or body having jurisdiction in 
the matter, is prohibited, except by express permission of the Board of 
Education or of its President, or, in the absence of the President, of the 
Vice-President; and the Board of Education may cause charges to be pre- 
ferred against any person violating this provision. Absence in pursuance 
of permission granted under the provisions of this sub-division shall not 
be considered absence from duty. (This subdivision was adopted Oct. 
33. 1907-) 

April 7, 1910. 
Mr. Egerton L Winthrop, Jr., 

President, Board of Education. 
My dear Mr. Winthrop, 

I respectfully submit the following resolution: 

WHEREAS, Mr. Abraham Stern has: 

(i) voted against the Interborough Association of Women Teachers on 
every occasion possible since its organization in February, 1906; 



566 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

(2) appeared and spoken in opposition to it at Albany at the hearing 
before the Assembly Committee on Affairs oi' Cities and before Governor 
Hughes; 

(3) appeared and spoken against it at two public hearings before Mayor 
McClellan and at least one public hearing of the Charter Legislative Com- 
mission; 

(4) attended and addressed at least one meeting of the Association of 
Men Teachers and Principals where plans were being made to defeat the 
aims of the Interborough Association of Women Teachers; 

(5) traveled to Albany with the representatives of the associations of 
male teachers and principals and other opponents of the Interborough As- 
sociation of Women Teachers; 

(6) attended and addressed at least one meeting of a so-called Primary 
Teachers' League managed by male teachers opposed to the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers, 

<7) and been throughout the existence of our association a member of 
the Committee on By-Laws of the Board of Education which has reported 
unfavorably on every proposition and resolution affecting the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers; 

AND WHEREAS, Mr. Robert L. Harrison has: 

(i) voted against the Interborough Association of Women Teachers on 
every occasion possible since its organization in February, 1906; 

(2) appeared and spoken in opposition to it at Albany at the hearing be- 
fore the Assembly Committee on Affairs of Cities and before Governor 
Hughes; 

(3) appeared and spoken against it at two public hearings before Mayor 
McClellan and at least one public hearing of the Charter Legislative Com- 
mission; 

(4) traveled to Albany with the representatives of the Associations of 
Male Teachers and Principals and other opponents of the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers; 

(5) and been throughout the existence of our association a member of 
the Committee on By-Laws of the Board of Education which has reported 
unfavorably on every proposition and resolution affecting the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers; 

AND WHEREAS, Mr. George W. Wingate has: 

(i) voted against the Interborough Association of Women Teachers on 
every occasion possible since its organization in February, 1906; 

(2) and been throughout the existence of our association a member of 
the Committee on By-Laws of the Board of Education which has reported 
unfavorably on every proposition and resolution affecting the Interborough 
Association of Women Teachers; 

AND WHEREAS, Mr. John Green has: 

(i) voted against the Interborough Association of Women Teachers on 
every occasion possible since its organization in February, 1906; 

AND WHEREAS, Mr. Egerton L. Winthrop, Jr., as President of the 
Board of Education is ex-officio member of all committees; 

AND WHEREAS, Mr. Winthrop has: 

(i) voted gainst the Interborough Association of Women Teachers on 
every occasion possible since its organization in February, 1906; 

(2) appeared and spoken against it at two public hearings before Mayor 
McClellan and at least one public hearing of the Charter Legislative Com- 
mission; 

AND WHEREAS, President Winthrop has appointed Mr. Abraham Stern, 
Mr. Robert L. Harrison, Mr. George W. Wingate, Mr_ John Greene and 
Mr, A, S Somers as the Teachers' Commission of the Board of Education; 

AND WHEREAS, The vote on the " Somers' Resolution " at the Special 

Meeting of the Board of Education held on March 16, 1910, was twenty- 

. three to sixteen against the Interborough Association of Women Teachers; 

THEREFORE, RESOLVED: That the Interborough Association of 
Women Teachers regrets that the Teachers' Salaries Commission as above 



BQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 567 

constituted does not more fairly represent the Board of Education on this 
question of salaries. 

Yours very truly, 

Grace C. Strachan, 
President, Interborough Association 
of Women Teachers. 

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

THE CITY OF NEW YORK 

Examination for License as Teacher of Shopwork in Elementary Schools 

Office of the Board of Examiners, 
Park Avenue and sgth Street, 
New York, September 30, 1909. 

A written examination of applicants for license as teacher of shopwork 
in the elementary schools of the City of New York will be conducted by 
the Board of Examiners on Thursday and Friday, March 3 and 4, 19 10, 
commencing at 9.30 a. m., in Room 422, Hall of the Board of Education, 
Park Avenue and 59th Street, Borough oi' Manhattan. An oral eaxmina- 
tion will be given at the call of the Board of Examiners. 

No person will be eligible for this license whose age on March 3, 191 o, 
is under eighteen or over thirty-five eyars. Under this provision an appli- 
cant will be regarded as eligible up to and including the day preceding his 
thirty-sixth birthday. 

Each applicant must have the qualifications indicated under (a), (b), or 
(c) following: 

(a) Graduation from a satisfactory high school or institution of equal 
or higher rank, or an equivalent academic training^ or the passing of an 
academic examination; and the completion of a satisfactory course of pro- 
fessional training of at least two years in shopwork. 

(b) Graduation from a college course recognized by the Regents of the 
University of the State of New York, which includes satisfactory courses 
in the principles of education and in shopwork. 

(c) Two years of successful experience as substitute teacher of shopwork 
in the schools of the City of New York, together with the completion of 
a satisfactory professional course in shopwork. 

The completion of a course of 90 hours in principles and practice of 
shopwork teaching at a recognized institution shall be regarded as a satis- 
factory course in shopwork within the meaning of clause (c)_ 

Candidates who, prior to July i, 1910, will have established eligibility 
under any one of the preceding heads may enter this examination. 

The written examination will be upon mechanical and freehand drawing, 
constructive and applied design, geometry, the principles and practice of shop- 
work, methods of instruction, and class management. 

The oral examination will include tests of technical skill and knowledge. 
A practical test of ability to teach will also form a part of the examin- 
ation. 

In the written and the oral answers to examination questions, an ap- 
plicant must give evidence of his ability to use the English language cor- 
rectly. 

All documents submitted as evidence of scholarship, training or experi- 
ence, must be originals, and must be accompanied by duplicate copies. The 
filing of such documents is optional. No diplomas will be received, except in 
cases where the institution is no longer in existence. 

Note: The academic examination required of certain applicants under 
class (a) will be conducted by the Board of Examiners on January 24 
1910, and again in May, 1910. A separate circular giving particulars will 
be forwarded on request. 

All persons in doubt as to their eligibility, and desiring information re- 



568 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

specting the matter, may communicate with the Board of Examiners not 
later than February 15^ 1910. 

A certificate of physical fitness made after examination by one of the 
physicians of the Board of Education will be required in the case of each 
applicant. No person will be licensed who has not been vaccinated within 
eight years, unless the examining physician recommends otherwise. 

The licenses issued under these regulations hold for the period of one 
year, and may be renewed for two successive years, without examination, 
in case the work of the holder is satisfactory. At the close of the third 
year of continuous successful service, the City Superintendent may make 
the license permanent. 

Section 67, subdivision 12, of the By-Laws of the Board of Education, 
reads as follows: 

" No married woman shall be appointed to any teaching or supervising 
position in the day public schools unless her husband is incapacitated from 
physical or mental disease to earn a livelihood, or has continuously aband- 
oned her for not less than three years prior to the date of appointment, 
provided proof satisfactory to the Board of Superintendents is furnished to 
establish such physical or mental disability or abandonment." 

The salary for men is $900 the first year, with an annual increase of 
$105 ior meritorious service, to a maximum of $2160; for women, $900 
the first year, with an annual increase of $100, to a maximum of $1200. 
Credit is allowed for outside experience of sufficient length and satisfactory 
character, in accordance with a fixed schedule. 

Note: The examination will begin promptly at the time stated above, and 
no applicant who i« late will be allowed to enter the examination room. 

WILLIAM H. MAXWELL. 
City Superintendent of Schools. 



THE AUTHOR 

Grace Charlotte Strachan was bom in Buffalo, New 
York, and was graduated from the Buffalo Normal 
School. After teaching in elementary and high schools 
there she came to Brooklyn, at the request of Prof. Frank- 
lin W. Hooper, then a member of the Board of Edu- 
cation. Before securing appointment here, she had to 
obtain licenses B and A. In the examination for the 
first she stood highest in a list of nearly three hundred 
candidates. 

After a year at Public School No. ii, Miss Strachan 
was appointed to the faculty of the Training School for 
Teachers. Two years later she was appointed Principal 
of Public School No. 42, which was made a branch of 
the training School for Teachers. She held this position 
four years. Thus for six years Miss Strachan was con- 
nected with the teachers in training, and she has since 
found many of her " old girls " in the schools she has 
supervised. She was elected associate superintendent of 
schools in Brooklyn, July 3, 1900, and under the new 
charter became district superintendent of schools of the 
City of New York. 

While principal of Public School No. 42, Miss Strachan 
taught in Evening High School, and later served as prin- 
cipal of Evening School No. 85. 

As principal she was especially noted for her work in 
developing the character of her pupils. The boys and 
girls organized into companies elected their own officers, 
and took practically entire charge of the school grounds, 
recesses, dismissals, and fire drills. She also organized an 
Anti-Cigarette League. 

The value of school-room decoration in the develop- 
ment of character was impressed upon the teachers, and 
soon the building, though old and dingy, became one of 
the most attractive schoolhouses in the city. 

569 



570 EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK 

As district superintendent, Miss Strachan has probably 
come into contact with more pupils and teachers than 
any other superintendent during the past ten years, on 
account of frequent changes of assignment. 

She is now in charge of districts 33 and 35, which 
register upwards of 32,000 children, mostly of foreign 
birth or parentage. As a result of the preponderance of 
foreigners and of the overcrowded conditions of the 
district, there are thousands of over-age children. Her 
division superintendent recently said that there were no 
other districts in the city where the " special " children 
were being so well cared for. The first class for deaf 
children in Brooklyn was established in one of her schools 
last February, and plans are ready for the establishment 
of classes for the blind, crippled and anaemic children, 
as soon as money for the transportation of such children 
is secured. 

In May, 1909, 2,500 pupils from her districts gave an 
exhibition of folk dancing and wand, Indian club, and 
dumb bell exercises, which was declared by Mr. Egerton 
L. Winthrop, Jr., President of the Board, Superintendent 
Meleney, and other distinguished visitors, the best of its 
kind they had ever seen. 

On the occasion of her re-election in January, 1910, 
rumors that she might be punished for her work in con- 
nection with the Interborough Association of Women 
Teachers proved unfounded. The Brooklyn Eagle of 
January 10, 1910, commenting on these rumors, said " Her 
name has been mentioned, indeed, in connection with the 
city superintendency and with an associate superintend- 
ency." 

Miss Strachan's work as the leader of the women 
teachers in their campaign for " equal pay " is familiar to 
any one who reads the newspapers. She believes that 
success is at hand, and that it will be won in the most 
dignified and desirable way — through the Board of Edu- 
cation and the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. 



JUl 2 1910 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



2 l£J@ 



